Australian Off-Court Struggles - 4/27/2011

Date: 4/27/2011
Result: Estoril R2, Jarmila Gajdosova def. Casey Dellacqua, 6-2 6-4
Why it matters:
- This is the first week back as Ms. Gajdosova for the Australian.  Following a flurry of suggestive tweets, Jarmila Groth confirmed that her marriage to ATP player Sam Groth is coming to an end.  And while personal drama might bring down most of her competitors, Gajdosova is rolling in Portugal.  Her focus and mental maturity to be able to separate off-court and on-court issues highlight her strength that has helped her put together her best results of her career over the last 52 weeks.  While her game seems most suited to faster courts, her game blossoms on clay.  While her run in Paris in 2010 was surprising, a repeat performance this year seems expected, even if her marriage is ending.
- Dellacqua is another Aussie with some turmoil in her life, though more of it involved physical ailments.  Not long after her memorable run to the 4th Round in Melbourne in 2008, Dellacqua's shoulder injury derailed all of her positive momentum.  She's trying to pull it altogether for another run.  She unfortunately ran into a better Aussie on the day, but she can take positives out of this.  She was competitive start to finish, but maybe the shoulder isn't fully there.  I of course realize breaks are more prevalent on clay (and generally on the WTA Tour), but Dellacqua lost serve 6 of 9 tries.  Her serve was effective back in her 2008 run, so if she can find that form once again, she's still young enough to try to get back to the top 50.

Honorable Mentions:
- Munich R2, Grigor Dimitrov def. Marcos Baghdatis - 36 76 62 - Baghdatis fails to close out another match.  As I've said previously, clay is never going to reward Baghdatis' style of play as well as hard court or even grass, but when he gives himself a chance to win he's got to close it out if he wants to actually become a title threat whenever he plays.  For Dimitrov, it's his turn to finally step up.  His contemporaries Dolgopolov and Raonic have been staking claims all year, so if he wants to keep pace, Dimitrov better figure out a way to make a big impact on tour.  Why not start with Munich?
- Belgrade R2, Novak Djokovic def. Adrian Ungur - 62 63 - He's BAAAACCKKK.  The hottest player of the year picked up where he left off with a comfortable win in front of his home crowd.  Djokovic looked slightly rusty and uncomfortable under foot, but this was never a contest.  Djokovic likely will run away with this title, so if he's smart, he'll use the matches in Belgrade to work on certain tricky aspects of his game in live-match situations to be sure he's in shape to make a run in any or all of Madrid, Rome and Paris.  For Ungur, it was already a decent week.  And hey, at least he didn't get bageled.