Sharapova & Ivanovic to compete at Brisbane International Tennis

Maria Sharapova and Ana Ivanovic will compete at Brisbane International in the opening week of 2015, organisers confirmed Wednesday. She will be the top seed at the $1 million tournament, reports Xinhua.

Maria Yuryevna Sharapova Russian professional Tennis player who is ranked world No. 2 by the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) and is the top Russian player. Sharapova has won 33 WTA singles titles, including five Grand Slam singles titles. She became the world No. 1 for the first time on August 22, 2005.

By winning the 2012 French Open, she became the sixth woman in the Open Era to complete the career Grand Slam in singles.

“Brisbane is such a great tournament. I had tried to make it so many years and I finally made it in 2014 and it was such a great experience. The fans were wonderful and the tournament organisation was great,” Sharapova said.

She was out of the action due to a right shoulder injury  in the past 4-5 months but she made her comeback last year here and made it all the way to the semi-finals but finally loose in a close contest against long-time rival Serena Williams.

On the other hand Former World No.1 Ivanovic, who fell out of top-10 in 2009 and is trying to get back among the elite for more than five years, finally made it back there in 2014 and ended up finishing the year all the way up at No.5.

Ana Ivanovic is a Serbian professional tennis player who as of 27 October 2014 is ranked world No. 5 by the Women’s Tennis Association. Ranked No. 1 in the world in 2008, Ivanovic has won 15 WTA Tour singles titles, including one Grand Slam singles title.

 She was named one of the “30 Legends of Women’s Tennis: Past, Present and Future” by Time.

“I can’t wait to return to Brisbane next year. It will be my first time competing at the tournament since 2012 and I’m really excited to have the opportunity to play there again,” Ivanovic said.