Maria Sharapova - Tokyo Greetings

If your a susbcriber at Sharapova’s official site you would have received this letter this morning:

Greetings from Tokyo!

I’m in Tokyo getting ready to play my next event. I love coming back here as I have so many happy memories including winning my 1st event here over 3 years ago and winning here 2 years ago. There was a press conference a few days ago, check out all the photos in the gallery! Keep coming back to the site for all the latest news and remember to go the forum to follow all the scores with other fans.

After playing here I will take a break for a couple of weeks and my next event will be Dubai. It was funny as there was rain last year and I had to play Hingis and Davenport in 1 day, you really don’t expect rain in the desert!

I got to the final of the Australian Open which was my first tournament this year and that was a lot to be proud of. In fact, in celebration of making it to the finals my official store is offering 15% off everything in the memorabilia and photos department! There are some pretty cool things in there like trading cards and photos and there’s even a framed piece with a snippet of the net from one of my matches! They’ve made it really easy so all you have to do is click here and you’ll go straight to my store. Enjoy!

Speak to you soon!!

Maria

Sharapova v.s Serena -AU Final -Video

It’s too painfull to watch, but still if your interested here is a 6 minute video of the final:

Serena Williams Defeats Sharapova

I have to say today’s Australian Final is the first time i’ve seen Maria Sharapova in total disarray.
Serena Williams practically had the easiest game of the tournament today as she brushed aside what looked like a tired, unmotivated Sharapova.

In the end Serena won 6-1, 6-2 in over an hour and she actually deserved it.

”I don’t know where to start,” said the 81st-ranked American, who tossed her racket in the air and fell on her back before tearfully dedicating her win to half-sister Yetunde Price during the on-court trophy presentation.

Price, 31, was killed in a drive-by shooting near the neighborhood in Los Angeles where the Williams sisters grew up.

Six months ago, Williams was ranked No. 139, hadn’t reached a final in two years and arrived in Australia with six events under her belt in the previous 13 months. It was her first title in 15 tournaments since winning the 2005 Australian Open. Before this tournament, she was written off as no more than a dangerous floater.

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Sharapova V.S Serena in the Final of AU Open

The final match between Maria Sharapova & Serena Williams is scheduled to start at 1.30 p/m Australian time, that’s about 7 hours from now.

Serena has been in fine form and has defied the odds to be in this final but still..we believe Maria will come out tops.

ALL THE BEST TO MARIA SHARAPOVA!

Australian Open

Sharapova Downs Clijsters in Australian Open

Maria Sharapova continued to play down her scrappy progress into the Australian Open final following her 6-4 6-2 victory over Kim Clijsters on Thursday. The Russian top seed made 33 unforced errors against the Belgian fourth seed before setting up a match against American Serena Williams, who beat her in the semi-finals at Melbourne Park two years ago.

“I felt I played a much better match all round today,” the 19-year-old told a news conference. “I was really focused and I did the right thing at the right time. I was patient when I needed to be. “I’m definitely glad that I could come up with a two-set win against her,” said Sharapova, who will be world number one next week. “I knew that in order to beat her I had to step it up.” Williams fought back from a set down to beat Sharapova in the 2005 semi-finals at Melbourne Park and, although she is unseeded and ranked only 81st in the world, Sharapova knows she faces a difficult match.

“I’m going to be playing against a player who didn’t expect too much coming into the tournament, so that makes her a dangerous opponent,” Sharapova said. Sharapova has played Williams four times with each winning twice.

She will now meet Serena Williams..who she beat in 2004 to win her first Grand Slam title at Wimbledon.

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Maria Sharapova Makes it to the Semi Final at AU Open

She has done it!..well you didn’t doubt it did you?

Sharapova has reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open for the third straight year after defeating Anna Chakvetadze, another 19-year-old Russian, 7-6 (5), 7-5.

“Sometimes I feel I don’t know if she knows what she’s doing,” Sharapova said. “She definitely has a lot of variety. If she wants to step in, she has a lot of power behind her strokes. But over all, at the end of the day, it’s just about who took the chances a little more.”

That has been Sharapova’s trademark throughout her career, and it does indeed take preternatural self-confidence to keep taking huge cuts at returns when the results have generally been unsatisfactory.

“She is stronger,” said Chakvetadze, a fast-rising blond Muscovite who, at 19, is the same age as Sharapova. “She’s a great fighter. I think she deserves this win.”

But even Sharapova conceded that she will probably have to raise her level if she is to break through to her first Australian Open final. She has come close the last two years, losing to Serena Williams in the 2005 semifinals despite holding three match points and then losing to Justine Henin-Hardenne last year in the same round in a three-set match.

Sharapova, assured of gaining the No. 1 ranking next month, had trouble on her serve, double-faulting on break point three times. But she had the only point on serve in the tiebreaker, where the last eight points finished on unforced errors.

The US Open champion was broken when serving for the match at 5-3 and wasted a match point with a backhand error in the next game. Sharapova got two more match points in the 12th game and finished it off in 2 hours, 14 minutes when Chakvetadze netted a forehand.

“It was very difficult, I didn’t feel like we had a lot of easy rallies,” Sharapova said. “I felt I had to work on every point.” Sharapova was very inconsistent, smacking clean winners to take one game, then committing glaring mistakes to lose the next. She finished with 32 winners but six double faults and 41 unforced errors and won only three more points than her opponent.

Sharapova, who looks toward her father, Yuri, after almost every point, got a warning for getting coaching from him as she served at 0-30 with the score tied at 2-2 in the second set. She then ran off four straight points to take the game.

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