Jelena Dokic will warm-up for the 2010 Australian Open, hopefully equally successful for her as the last one, at the January 8-16 Moorilla Hobart International.

At the 2009 Australian Open the former world No.4 reached the quarterfinals as a wildcard and 187th-ranked player, defeating three seeded players on the way. Since that unprecedented success Dokic hasn't made such major headlines concerning her on-court results, but she did win two ITF tournaments, in Athens (Greece) in September and Poitiers (France) in October.

The 26-year-old Dokic is currently ranked 57th. (source: Reuters, photo: Ralf Reinecke)

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Our dear reader Teerin is contributing to Women's Tennis Blog once again, this time by creating a countdown of the best moments in the 2009 tennis season.

Teerin would like to have been able to include more memorable situations, but YouTube videos can't be more than 10 minutes long. Which WTA moments would you add to Teerin's Top 10? I would include the emotional retirement of Ai Sugiyama and also, I would put Kim Clijsters' US Open win on top of the list.

Teerin, thank you so much for your continuous and active support of Women's Tennis Blog.

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Jelena Dokic hadn’t played since a first-round loss at Wimbledon and was unable to shake off the rust of the two-month layoff, losing to Kirsten Flipkens 6-3 6-4 in the opening round of the US Open.

The 26-year-old committed 41 unforced errors, nine double faults and no aces in the match against the 93rd-ranked Flipkens.

Dokic had a spectacular career revival at the start of the season, but later had to make another break from tennis, because of mononucleosis.

Despite yet another disappointment and unlucky course of events in her career, Dokic is determined to rebound and play well the rest of the season.

"It counts how many times you get up, not how many times you fall down," said the Australian. (source: Reuters, photo: Ralf Reinecke)

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Second seed Serena Williams beat 133rd-ranked Virginia Ruano Pascual of Spain 6-2 6-0 to move into the third round of Roland Garros. Jelena Dokic, whose comeback I enjoy following, had to retire against fourth seed Elena Dementieva because of a back injury.

Williams had a much easier time in the second round than in her first-round match when she needed nine match points to get through a three-setter. Interestingly, the American believes her game is much better now than when she won four consecutive Grand Slam titles in 2002-03.

The 'Serena Now' would definitely beat the 'Other Serena,' just in general. I'm older. I think I'm wiser. I think I'm just a more mature player. Back then, it was more nitty-gritty. And now it's more composed and planned-out playing.

Jelena Dokic progressed to the second round, and it’s very disappointing that she was forced to retire while leading by a set against Dementieva. Dokic left the court in floods of tears, after quitting with the score at 6-2 3-4 against. She appeared to pull something in her lower back at 2-2 in the second set.

Dementieva was full of sympathy for her distressed opponent and even said: "I didn't deserve to win this match." (sources: FOX Sports, Reuters; photos: Stephane Martinache)

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The only seeds playing on the Warsaw’s clay on the second day of the Premier-level tournament survived their first-round opponents.

As the first round came to a conclusion, No.5 seed Sara Errani of Italy rallied from 4-2 and 5-3 down in the third set to edge qualifier Greta Arn 6-2 1-6 7-6(2), while No.6 seed Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia came from 6-3 3-1 down to beat Nuria Llagostera Vives 3-6 6-3 6-3.

Former world No.4 Jelena Dokic, now ranked 72nd, still hasn’t added up to her more than sensational run to the Australian Open quarterfinals. Since then, the Australian hasn’t made a better result than the second round of Miami, and today at Warsaw Open she lost in the first round to qualifier Ioana Raluca Olaru 6-4 6-3.

The entire second round will be played on Wednesday, and the most popular participant at the tournament, Maria Sharapova, will have a first career meeting with lucky loser Darya Kustova. Sharapova will play only her second singles match after a nine-month injury layoff. (photo: Ralf Reinecke)

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