Battling the curse of the babes

2004-06-21 12:24

London - Russian golden girl Maria Sharapova is determined to avoid the curse of the Wimbledon babe when she saunters regally into the spotlight of the All England Club next week.

The 17-year-old, destined to be the darling of the British press with her 6ft frame, long legs and flowing blonde hair, is entering an arena where the likes of earlier targets of tabloid fever - Anna Kournikova, Daniela Hantuchova, Jelena Dokic and Mirjana Lucic - have all faltered.

"It's pretty normal to be compared with Anna but I am myself," says Sharapova.

But Wimbledon history hasn't been kind to tennis's cover girls.

Kournikova, just 16 at the time, became only the second woman to make the semi-finals here on debut when she sent pulses racing and shutters into overtime in 1997.

However, in the following six years, the Russian beauty played just three more times, never got beyond the fourth round and a chronic back injury has meant she has played just once on the tour in the last 18 months.

In her nine years as a professional, Kournikova never won a title, unlike Sharapova who already has three to her name.

Hantuchova made the quarter-finals in 2002 and that was the start of her troubles.

A skeletal Hantuchova, just 20, returned in 2003, lost in the second round and found herself battling allegations that she was suffering from an eating disorder.

It all got too much. After her marathon defeat to Japan's Shinobu Asagoe, she dissolved into floods of tears.

Working on the mental side

"It was very frustrating because this tournament means so much to me. I played one of the longest matches I've ever played and felt like physically I could have gone on for another two hours.

"It's the mental side I have to work on because I have been in this situation a couple of times and did not handle it well."

Dokic can sympathise having become an old-hand at fending off media enquiries over her career, her father and her love life.

Her problems started when, as a 16-year-old qualifier, she beat world number one and top seed Martina Hingis in the first round in 1999 and reached the semi-finals a year later.

But the antics of father Damir, who has been banned from a number of venues, as well as her doomed relationship with Brazilian racing driver Enrique Bernoldi have led to her never managing to get beyond the fourth round in her last three appearances.

But the curse of the babes has claimed no sadder victim than Croatia's Mirjana Lucic.

At just 17 and world ranked 134, Lucic reached the semi-finals beating Monica Seles on the way before losing to Steffi Graf.

She made the second round a year later but has never returned.

Despite being just 22, she is already writing her autobiography where details of mental and physical abuse which have been alleged at her estranged father Marinka are to feature.

"There were more beatings than anyone can imagine, sometimes because I lost a game, sometimes because I lost a set," said Lucic.

- AFP