Eighth seed Ana Ivanovic defeated Alisa Kleybanova in the second round of the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships and in that way avenged the loss to the Russian in the third round of the Australian Open last month. The world number eight Ivanovic beat Kleybanova, ranked 27th, 7-5 6-4.

Ivanovic established a 3-0 lead in the first set, but Kleybanova managed to return from being one break down and eventually leveled at 4-4. Ivanovic, however, managed to break once again, in the 12th game, and take the first set 7-5. The second set saw no breaks of serve until the final game when Kleybanova surrendered to Ivanovic and lost the match on Ivanovic’s second match point.

The 21-year-old Serb, who is playing her first tournament since hiring coach Craig Kardon, will play either Urszula Radwanska or Camille Pin in the third round of the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships.

Only the second day of the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships is in progress, and we have already seen many interesting results.

The latest one saw the seventh seed Svetlana Kuznetsova falling to fellow Russian Elena Vesnina, failing to win even one game in the deciding set. Final score of this second-round match was 6-4 3-6 6-0.

Vesnina had defeated China’s Li Na in the first round, in three sets, too: 1-6 6-4 6-4.

The second day of the tournament is not over yet, but ninth seed Agnieszka Radwanska and 15th seed Anna Chakvetadze said goodbye in the first round. Agnieszka lost to her sister Urszula Radwanska 6-4 6-3, while Anna lost to world No.74 Ayumi Morita 7-5 6-2. Morita is the lucky loser who entered the tournament with Israeli Shahar Peer being denied a visa for the United Arab Emirates.

No other seeds have fallen on day 2 yet, although one interesting matchup is in progress at the moment. Ana Ivanovic is playing Alisa Kleybanova, the Russian who upset herin the Australian Open third round last month.

Let’s also mention that Agnes Szavay and Maria Kirilenko lost in the first round yet again. Their defeats happened on day 1, on Sunday. (photo: vesnina-elena.com)

Israeli world No.48 Shahar Peer has been denied entry into the United Arab Emirates for the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships, and will hence not be able to play the tournament which features all the world's top-10 ranked women's players and for which she is qualified by ranking.

UAE have not explained the reason for not giving Peer a visa, but the country does not have diplomatic relations with Israel.

WTA chief executive Larry Scott said the women's tour was "deeply disappointed" by the decision.

"Ms Peer has earned the right to play in the tournament and it's regrettable that the UAE is denying her this right," he said.

"Ms Peer and her family are obviously extremely upset and disappointed by the decision of the UAE and its impact on her personally and professionally."

Peer was supposed to play 15th seed Anna Chakvetadze in the first round of the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships. (source: BBC, photo: AnalogKid203)

Yesterday I wrote that Maria Sharapova’s participation in the Open GDF SUEZ and Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships was doubtful, but now it’s been confirmed on her official website that she won’t play those events which start on February 9th and 16th.

The reason for Sharapova’s withdrawal is of course the infamous shoulder injury. It’s worrying because she withdrew from the Australian Open saying her shoulder was doing great, adding that she just wasn’t at the high enough level to compete at such a tournament.

However, now she’s pulling out of Paris and Dubai saying: "My shoulder continues to improve every day and I am working very hard on the practice court. I'm looking forward to being back on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour very soon." (photo: Ralf Reinecke)

Elena Dementieva came from a set down and beat fellow Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova 4-6 6-3 6-2 for the title at the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships.

World No.11 Dementieva, who became the first-ever Russian singles champion in Dubai, won her ninth career single title today.

Eighth-seeded Dementieva won the Dubai title on her event debut, while second seed Kuznetsova suffered her second loss in Dubai final, last time was in 2004 to Justine Henin.

After Kuznetsova took the first set and won the first game of the second, Dementieva reeled off four straight games to take control of the second and broke serve in the ninth game to send the match to the third set. Read more »