Spotlight: Jill Craybas

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Scott is at it again. This time, he shines the light on Jill Craybas, the only American woman left in the singles draw:

She came into the tournament on a four-match losing streak and hadn’t beaten a player ranked in the top 100 this year. But at the BNP Paribas Open, Jill Craybas racked up wins over former top-tenners Jelena Dokic and Nicole Vaidisova, as well as 16th seed Anabel Medina Garrigues. She now faces top seed Dinara Safina in the fourth round.

Craybas attributes this run to, “working really hard the last couple of months in the off-season. [i] worked on a lot of different things that my coach wanted me to experiment with a little bit. I think it’s starting to come together. I just keep fighting. I’ve been competing hard, and I think it’s been a big difference.

“Mentally, the last few weeks I’ve been a little bit stronger than I was at the beginning of the year,” said Craybas. “Instead of worrying about what I’m doing well or what’s not going well, I’ve just taken an approach of, even if things aren’t feeling quite the way I’d like them to, just going out and competing my hardest. The competing has really helped me, focusing on that a little bit more.”

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My fondest memory of Jill came during her interview after she beat Serena Williams at Wimbledon in 2005. The corps bombarded her with questions about Serena, Serena's fitness, Serena's game, Serena's forehand, etc... Jill calmly and pointedly made the reporters aware that this was her big day and she would only answer questions about herself, her game, and her team, thank you very much.

Spotlight: Amélie Mauresmo

Christina Ward

Most of you know by now that Amélie Mauresmo is my girl. One of these days, I intend to see her play tennis up close and personal, but that day has not yet come to pass. Though I hold out hope that it does before she hangs up her racquet and moves on to full-time wine collecting or motor biking in the south of France.

This week, Scott Minor over at Talk About Tennis is covering the BNP Paribas Open. Here's an excerpt of his piece Introspective Amélie after her "scratchy" three-set victory over Anna-Lena Groenefeld:

The Frenchwoman took a look back at the highs and lows of her 15-year career, including winning the Australian Open, Wimbledon, and the year-end WTA Championships once each, “You have moments when it’s a little bit more difficult to go to practice and to make the effort and to physically go through the pain. But overall, I didn’t find it difficult, except those moments which are – we’re not robots. We’re not machines. We’re human.

“I think it was the summer of 2007, where I really asked myself the question whether I want to keep going or not. In the end, I didn’t find the answer quickly. It took me a few months to really feel that, for some reason, I don’t have enough.

“At the end of 2008, I really was thinking, okay, I go for 2009, and that’s still how I feel in my mind. I go for 2009, and we’ll see how it goes. If I play well, if I’m injury-free, how do I feel? Am I happy on the court? Is this passion still there? I guess from now on I will, every end of the season, I will probably try to see inside of myself if I want to keep going for another one.”

Fan or not, read the rest. When the elder stateswomen of the game speak, people need to listen.