Another of the pin-up girls has now gone from this year’s Wimbledon as top seed and world No.1 Ana Ivanovic crashed out in a straight-sets defeat to the Chinese doubles specialist Zheng Jie.

We all had high hopes for the French Open champion, and the newspapers will certainly be disappointed, but as was almost the case with her second round game against Natalie Dechy, she was lost from the moment she walked on to Court No.1 at the All England Club.

Zheng won the women’s doubles title in 2006, but few casual followers of tennis will remember her, as a serious injury last year ruled her out of much of the season, which saw her ranking drop outside the top 100, her presence at Wimbledon secured by wild card entry.

'She has the physical and technical elements to her game, but lacks mental stability at times'


The pressure of being a Grand Slam champion and world No.1 clearly got to Ivanovic at Wimbledon. After coming through a relatively easy opening round match against Rossana de los Rios, despite hitting more unforced errors than her opponent, she continued to play erratic shots against experienced campaigner Dechy, while also struggling with her serve, losing the first set to 2 on a tie break.

She then had to save match points in the second set before winning that tie break to 3, eventually coming through 10-8 in the final set in a match that lasted almost 3 and a half hours.

After her humiliating 6-1, 6-4 defeat to Zheng, it’s clear that Ivanovic has a long way to go to becoming a great player, despite her current ranking. She has the physical and technical elements to her game, but lacks mental stability at times: when it’s going wrong for her, she looks uncomfortable on many basic shots, trying to power through her opponents, instead of breaking them down, often resulting in her hitting wild unforced errors if she’s caught off balance.

She is young, though, and at just 20 years of age, it has to be difficult to deal with. Even a young Roger Federer struggled with his mentality in his younger days and took a few years on the tour to truly mature as a player. Few young players thrust into the spotlight as the best player in the world just days after winning their first Grand Slam could deal with the pressure that it brings, and if she can forget about being No.1 and get back to concentrating on her game, longevity will come for Ivanovic, as will the Grand Slam tournaments.

The BBC carried a great feature during a rain delay on the rise of Federer from being a promising junior with attitude problems to becoming the best tennis player the world has seen, and Ivanovic’s entourage would do well to ensure she sees that. Everybody can learn from Federer, and the same is true of Ivanovic: if she can focus her mind on her game while on court, she could go on dominate at the top of the women’s game.

Until then her greatest battle will always against herself.