's-HERTOGENBOSCH, The Netherlands - One year ago, Michaella Krajicek thrilled her home crowd with a title run at the Ordina Open; this year she returns to the Tier III event as the defending champion hoping to once again light up the crowds at the grass courts of the Autotron Rosmalen. Follow along with the Dutch phenom's week in the latest Sony Ericsson WTA Tour Player Blog straight from 's-Hertogenbosch.

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Thursday, June 21, 2007

Hello again everyone!

I had a busy day planned for today, so I'm glad I can do this one more time :) This morning I went to breakfast with my little brother; my mom and my dad had already gone back home so we were together most of the day! We played some more of his computer games (and I lost each time, especially his soccer game). We also went to the tournament together and I did an interview for Ordina, the tournament sponsor. That was a pretty long one actually, 30-45 minutes, and I signed some autographs also, not just for kids but also for their parents and grandparents, which is always great to see, people of all ages enjoying tennis.

After we had lunch, we went back home to Almere. I went for a bike ride with my brother, and then me, him and my mom all went into the city to do shopping for a few hours! My mom was looking for a pair of jeans but as always, we never ended up getting what we were looking for and I came away with a tonne of other things. I ended up getting four t-shirts, jeans for myself, sunglasses and shorts or something... My mom got two t-shirts but no jeans. I always buy the most out of everyone... it's sometimes a problem!

We came back later on and ordered pizza; I barely ate anything all day so I was very hungry! We watched Grease after that. A classic movie. I didn't play today at all, which is good, because I needed to take at least a day off before preparing for Wimbledon. I've had three long days of matches this week. We're driving up to Wimbledon on Friday actually; it's a really fun trip and we'll be going on the ferry, too, and then going up to London. My dad's not a big fan of driving on the left side of the road so I hope I won't be getting into any car crashes! Hopefully I'll hit when we get there and then over the weekend I'll be practicing a lot.

Wimbledon is definitely my favorite tournament, even though I haven't played it that many times. I love all of the Slams and they are all in great cities but I just love England. I love English accents, they are very royal. Just the way they speak is cool to listen to. The tournament also treats all of us well too. I do love New York City as well though, and of course here in Holland; I'd say these three are the Top 3 places to play for me. But Wimbledon especially, because my big brother won there, and he's going to be there too this year to support me and practice with me. We couldn't play the mixed doubles though, unfortunately!

I'm seeded at Wimbledon, which is really exciting. Earlier this year it was a goal of mine to be seeded at Wimbledon so I've reached it. I also want to make the Top 30 this year... so we'll see if that one comes true too.

I hope everyone enjoyed my blog this week. Playing tennis is lots of fun but all of the off-court stuff we do, like this blog, is the most fun. Thanks to everyone who has been supporting me this week and the rest of the season. Hopefully I can do this again soon. My website should be done in the next few weeks so I'll keep you all posted about that.

Talk to you all soon!!

Misa

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Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Unfortunately, I won't be defending my title this year. I lost to Safina, 64 36 64. It was a really good match, though. She was just better today; she served better, which was the key to the match. I was really enjoying it because it was on Centre Court and I had so much support from the crowd, but I am still disappointed I couldn't win. One of us had to lose. I have to say that we played better than last year's final. We're both young and improving, and have lots ahead of us.

It was tough to play my doubles match after losing in the singles. It was hard to refocus. Although we played pretty well in the doubles match, we lost to the top seeds, Chan and Chuang. We had a lot of break chances but we just couldn't make any of them. They're such a good team though, making the Australian Open final and winning a few tournaments; but it's still disappointing. It has just been a really tough day today! I'm really tired, so maybe tonight I'll just relax and watch a movie...

I try to keep a positive attitude when I lose, but it's not that easy. When you're focused and feel like you're playing well and things just don't work out, it's tough. I just couldn't break Safina in the third set. But 30 seconds after I lost I had to do an interview on-court and I think it went pretty well; I congratulated her and said maybe next time I'm going to need some help to beat her, maybe I will get one of those voodoo dolls or something, because she has beaten me four times this year now! At least I was able to make some people laugh with that. There were also lots of kids out there, as it was kids' day today. They were so cute! The support they give is inspiring and it definitely helps you get over a tough loss.

Aside from my matches I didn't have time for much today. I slept in because the barbecue was really late last night, I think it finished around midnight. It was really nice! It's great that it is an ATP event here too, because it's nice to see the guys. It's something different! This morning I had a hit before my match and then watched some of Haase against Benneteau; Haase lost, so it was not a very good day for Dutch tennis, but we did have one winner so that's good. Then I had the two matches and that's about it. Severine and I will play a few more tournaments together at least. The team we beat in the first round was good and we played well against one of the best teams of 2007.

Continuing my comments from the other day, I heard that I'm even on billboards on the highways. I couldn't believe it, like it is not only here, it's outside the tournament too. I haven't seen them but apparently they're there. I don't know what to say... like I said, hopefully people aren't sick of me! I've been getting some good comments about my blog though. My website should be done soon so I hope to have something like this... and if not I'd love to do this blog again too.

I'm not leaving you guys yet, though - I have sponsor activities to do tomorrow for Ordina and maybe Maurice Lacroix, so I'll definitely have things to talk about for one more day!

Until tomorrow,

Misa