The third Slovenia Open WTA tournament will start in the seaside resort of Portoroz on Monday. The US$ 145,000 tournament running until 23 September will feature nine of the world's top 50 woman tennis players.
The top-seeded player at the tournament will be France's Tatiana Golovin, who is ranked 19th on the WTA list. Today she will play against Lilia Osterloh of the US. The first match of the tournament will be played between fifth-seeded Klara Zakopalova from the Czech Republic, who won the first Slovenia open in Portoroz in 2005, and Russia's Elena Likhovtseva.
Slovenia's top player Katarina Srebotnik, who is third-seeded, will this afternoon face Masa Zec Peskiric, also from Slovenia.
Slovenia will have two more contestants in the tournament: Polona Hercog will first try to beat Russia's Elena Vesnina, while Andreja Klepac still does not know who her first opponent will be.
Srebotnik said ahead of the tournament that she felt great and more relaxed than in the previous years, especially because she was not top-seeded this time.
Last year's surprise winner was Austria's 15-year old Tamira Paszek, who beat sixth-seed Elena Maria Camerin of Italy in what was only her seventh WTA tournament outing. Before the win, Paszek was outside the top 250 on the WTA ranking.
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