The cream of the WTA Tour has gathered in Doha.
SERBS TO SHINE IN THE SUN
By Andy Schooler
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It's a sign of the times that the WTA Tour's season-ending Sony Ericsson Championships have moved to Doha, Qatar.
The oil-rich Middle East is attracting more and more sporting events these days and it's no surprise to see a whopping total prize fund of US$4.45million up for grabs this week.
The latest venue for this tournament, one of the biggest away from the Grand Slams, brings a notable change - for the first time in more than 30 years it will be held outdoors.
The recently-laid Plexipave hardcourt (similar to the surface used at the Australian Open) replaces the Rebound Ace on which the regular WTA Tour event in February was played.
It also means that the eight women who have qualified for this tournament are not the best prepared.
For the past couple of months, they have largely been playing in faster indoor conditions. Now they head for the hotter (around 30C) and higher-bouncing Qatari climate.
It's hardly the same as going from clay to grass, but those gathered here will still need to adapt. When this sort of surface was used for the first time Down Under this year, it played slow according to most players.
The field is initially split into two groups of four, with the top two in each pool qualifying for Saturday's semi-finals.
The White Group sees favourite Jelena Jankovic tackle fellow Serb Ana Ivanovic, plus Russians Svetlana Kuznetsova and Vera Zvonareva.
The Maroon Group features the two Williams sisters, Venus and Serena, plus Russia's Dinara Safina and Elena Dementieva.
First let's look at the White Group.
Here the two Serbs look the players to beat.
Jankovic is the form player this autumn. During a 12-match winning streak she collected titles in Beijing (on outdoor hard), Stuttgart and Moscow.
That all came on the back of a US Open final appearance, while earlier in the year she also made the final in Miami.
Last year Jankovic turned up at this event in Madrid shattered and nursing illness. She duly lost all three matches. A repeat of that appears highly unlikely, especially after a two-week break.
She's not the biggest hitter here and has a more defensive game than some of her rivals, but if her form holds, Jankovic will be the one to beat.
Fellow Serb Ivanovic, the Australian Open runner-up, lost her way in mid-season but appears to have rediscovered some form at the right time.
A semi-final run in Zurich ended a miserable streak and set up a tournament win in Linz the following week.
Mentally she will also be in a good place coming here as she holds a winning record against all three of her group opponents and this year she's 5-0 against them.
She'll certainly have her backers at 11/2 for the title and 2/1 for the group.
While we'd expect those two to progress, it may be worth backing Kuznetsova to throw a spanner in the works.
She holds a winning record against both Jankovic and Zvonareva and is a proven performer in Qatar - her two final appearances in Doha give her the best record at the Khalifa Tennis Complex in this field. At home on the clay, Kuznetsova will be happy if the new surface does indeed play slower than its predecssor.
Even if it doesn't, she'll like having the sun on her back once more - she reached the finals in Beijing and Tokyo before the tour headed indoors - and has twice been to the US Open final.
Always a battler, Kuznetsova looks a little big to win the group at 8/1, especially when you consider she may only need to win two matches to do so.
Turning to the Maroon Group and the bookies clearly expect the Williams sisters to cruise through. However, we feel that's a bit of a naive view.
This isn't a tournament they've appeared too fussed about in the past.
Admittedly both have suffered more than most with injuries, but their attendance record for the Tour Championships is pretty dreadful.
Venus has qualified on seven previous occasions but played only twice and has yet to reach the final.
Serena's is better but not by much. Three times she's qualified and not turned up and when she did play last year she withdrew after her first match.
Serena did win in 2001 but it's hard to see a repeat given the fact that she's played just one competitive match since her US Open win in early September, capitulating after taking the first set 6-0 against Na Li in Stuttgart.
Okay, I know she's shown the ability to win with little preparation in the past, but that's been at the Slams -events clearly regarded by the Williamses as much more important than this. And the cash on offer here is hardly a factor to these multi-millionaires.
Having won in Zurich recently, Venus looks better prepared to launch a title challenge but her price looks short enough - 6/1 for the title and 7/4 to top the group.
So where does the value lie?
Well, Dementieva may be Olympic champion but her season has tailed off a little since that golden success. She also has an awful 3-14 win-loss record at this event and trails on the head-to-heads against all three of her group foes.
Instead, Safina looks worth a small play.
She finally seemed to shed the tag 'Marat Safin's sister' this year when she reached the final of the French Open.
That appeared to fill her with confidence and during the following summer hardcourt season she won 24 of her 26 matches, a run which brought her three WTA titles and an Olympic silver medal.
Safina will be delighted to be back outdoors and, like Kuznetsova, she'll be quite happy to see the surface play a little slower. Although her poor record against the Williamses is a concern at this stage, the 11/2 about her winning the group may look generous indeed if the Americans' attitude is not spot on.
So what's the staking plan?
Well, admittedly we're taking a risk by dismissing the Williams sisters' chance of winning, but that's what we're prepared to do.
Instead the form Serbian pair of Jankovic and Ivanovic are our tips for the trophy.
Jankovic's recent results suggest her favouritism is justified and we're happy to back her at 7/2.
However, we'll also get Ivanovic on our side as she appears to be returning to form and with a winning record against all of her group opponents you'd expect her to reach the semis at least.
While we expect the Serbs to progress, Kuznetsova's 8/1 quote to win the group looks too big.
The other group appears harder to call but if the Williams sisters aren't at the top of their game things will be more open than the quotes suggest.
Therefore Safina, excellent on hardcourts in the second half of the season, is worth a small punt in this pool at 11/2, especially if the courts turn out to play slow, as they did in Australia.
The action gets under way in Doha at 1400 GMT on Tuesday and is being televised live in the UK by British Eurosport.
Preview posted at 1615GMT on 03/11/2008.
