 | Born: 16/7/76 Nationality: Israeli Seeded: 19 World ranking: 20 French Open best:
4th round (1998, 1995) Recent record:
2003: 2nd round
2002: 1st round
2001: 1st round |
Two quarter-finals and a last-16 defeat to Venus Williams since the start of the clay-court season will have been encouraging after a tough start to the year. A high-profile defeat to French prodigy Tatiana Golovin at the Australian Open was made worse when she lost to the same player in Paris the following week.
It came on the back of a steady improvement in 2002 and 2003, when the 27-year-old picked up a total of five tour titles.
She beat Klara Koukalova and Jelena Kostanic to win her titles in Sopot and Helsinki last year, but struggled whenever she faced a top-10 player.
The Israeli, formerly Anna Smashnova, remains very much in the second tier of the world game and has yet to threaten in a Grand Slam.
Pistolesi's Grand Slam record is woeful, with only two fourth round appearances at the French Open, and she needs to improve at the highest level to break into the top 10.
MMIX
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