Marina Erakovic came within a whisker of adding another ITF Women’s Circuit title to her collection over the weekend.  Marina reached the final with ease, winning her quarter-final against Stefania Boffa 6-0 6-2 and her semi 6-1 6-3 against Andrea Hlavackova.  The Aucklander raced to a 6-0 first set win in the final before Portugal’s Neuza Silva responded by taking the last two sets 7-5 6-3.  Marina capped her most successful week of the year so far by winning the doubles with Melanie South.

Marina Erakovic posted an easy second round win at the US$25000 ITF Women’s Circuit tournament at La Coruna, Spain.  The top seed beat Silvia Soler-Espinosa from Spain 6-0 6-4 and is now set to play Stefania Boffa (Sui) for a semi-final spot.

Paris based Sebastian Lavie is currently playing ITF Junior Circuit tournaments in South Africa.  At the Grade 2 RVTA Junior ITF this week he lost first round to fifth seed Alex Sanders (Aus) 6-2 6-2.  The Australian was a quarter-finalist this year at the Auckland 18 and under Summer Championships losing to eventual winner Austen Childs.  Lavie was also a first round casualty last week at a similar Grade 2 event.

Top seed Tanya Samodelok was convincingly beaten by sixteenth seed Luksika Kumkhun (Tha) in the third round of the 13-14 des Hauts de Seine junior tournament in France.  The girl from Thailand won 6-2 6-0 to move through to the quarters.  In her previous match she had been equally dominant.

Sacha Jones lost 6-2 6-7 6-2 to third seed Andrea Hlavackova (Cze) in the first round of the US$25000 tournament at La Coruna, Spain.  The Czech player is currently ranked 245 on the WTA list.  Meanwhile, the top seeded pairing of Marina Erakovic and Melanie South comfortably won their opening doubles match to move into the quarter-finals. 

Top seed Tanya Samodelok has moved into the third round of the 13-14 des Hauts de Seine tournament in France after a fairly routine 6-2 6-3 win against Natasha Forbes (GBR).  Tanya now faces sixteenth seed Luksika Kumkhun (Tha) for a quarter-final berth in the category 2 European Tour event.  While Tanya is favoured to win the tournament as the top seed, an Australian is seeded first in the boy’s draw.

Fifth seed Rubin Statham lost 6-4 7-6 to top seed Jamie Baker in the final round of qualifying at a Challenger tournament in Lexington, Kentucky.  William Ward, who attends the University of Kentucky, defaulted in the first round of qualifying with the score at 0-4.