KEY POINTS:
Ana Ivanovic, let us be clear, is not one of tennis's glamour girls.
We had that denial from the glamour girl herself here yesterday shortly after she had won her delayed first round match against Melinda Czink.
That said, the possibilities for confusion on this question are enormous.
The official Ana Ivanovic website, for instance, offers a series of downloadable screensavers featuring its subject in poses that might be characterised as sultry, thoughtful, elegant and pouting.
There's even one of her playing tennis.
At the age of 19, the girl from Belgrade who used to have to train in the morning to avoid Nato air raids and perfected her technique in an abandoned swimming pool because of an absence of more conventional facilities has established herself in a far more comfortable and, yes, glamorous state.
As she made her way back to the clubhouse during the rain which interrupted her eventual 6-0,7-6 win over the 133rd ranked Hungarian, strenuously shepherded by an official, the multitude of faces on either side turned and registered her passing with expressions of surprise, fascination, envy and lust.
Just over a fortnight after reaching the French Open final, where she was a nervous 6-1, 6-2 loser to Justine Henin, the sixth-seeded Serb is now three matches away from a possiblequarter-final with the defending champion Amelie Mauresmo, beyond which lies a semi-final with the 2004 Wimbledon champion, Maria Sharapova.
Maintaining she had not looked at the draw at all, she greeted that information with a brief smile, adding: 'Thanks for that.' But then the prospect should not be that fearsome for the Serb, given that she announced her presence to the wider world by beating Mauresmo on the Frenchwoman's home ground of Roland Garros in 2005, and disposed of the Russian 6-2, 6-1 en route to this year's French Open final.
Her opening match, which appeared to be a formality after a first set which required just 19 minutes, rapidly became a more challenging affair as the Hungarian, who has previously said how much she admires Boris Becker for being a fighter on the court, began to pass her taller opponent with a series of thwacking forehands.
Urged on by her coach, Nandor Veres - "that's the way, Melinda!" - the blonde from Budapest succeeded in banishing her dark-haired opponent from the comfort zone before succumbing7-3 in the tie-break.
Ivanovic's performance in Paris was marked upon her return to Belgrade by massive public acclaim.
Accompanied by her compatriots Novak Djokovic and Jelena Jankovic - seeded third here and a 6-1, 6-1 winner in her second round against Slovakia's Jarmila Gajdosova - she was welcomed in Parliament Square by between 10,000 and 15,000 people.
"It was an unbelievable feeling because they used only to do that for basketball and volleyball players when they would win gold medals," she said.
"This was one of the first times they organised for individual athletes."Having reached the third round and fourth round in successive years in SW19, Ivanovic looks capable of improving that record still further, and she believes she will turn her recent Roland Garros final to good advantage.
"It's definitely something I will never forget," she said.
"Every next match I play, if I get this feeling that I'm nervous I will just go probably back to that experience and say, 'What can be more nervous than a Grand Slam final?' So that will help me for sure."
If she's correct, there might yet be another Parliament Square love-in next month.
Later the woman who made Ivanovic appear a novice at the Roland Garros earlier this month, Justine Henin, took a second step towards securing what would be her first Wimbledon title with a 6-0, 6-4 win over Russia's Vera Dushevina.
The 1997 Wimbledon champion, Martina Hingis, won her second-round match against Aiko Nakamura of Japan, 6-1, 6-2.
- INDEPENDENT
