Former No. 1 Ana Ivanovic ended the year on a high note, three weeks ago winning her first title of the year in Linz, and Sunday winning the ‘Loser Bowl,’ otherwise known as the Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions in Bali, featuring the top eight players (and random wildcards) who did not make the year-end WTA Championships field.

Notes: (1) Dementieva opens against Peng, and (3) Wickmayer against the Osaka finalist Schnyder; wildcards went to Dementieva, Russian Yulia Putintseva, Luxembourg’s Mandy Minella, and France’s Virginie Razzano; in last year’s final Francesca Schiavone defeated Olga Govortsova.

Earlier in the week the Serb was forced to rush off the court during a match, receiving a game penalty for a gastric bathroom explosion she blamed on eating yogurt before the match.

A big day in men’s tennis is on tap for Friday.

Juan Martin Del Potro is still winless in his comeback. Rafael Nadal leads five of the top 6 in action today.

Great matchups litter the Sunday US Open schedule.

“I was checked by the medical team before I went on court and they were courtside for monitoring,” Azarenka said. “I felt worse as the match went on, having a headache and feeling dizzy.”

Sharapova under stress in the third set lost her trademark “Byouooooooooo! Byouooooooooo!” shrieks when hitting the ball, looking for Clijsters to put her out of her misery, and graciously shaking hands and offering congratulations at the net.

The development was that Montreal’s star power suddenly began to dip with all the pull-outs, and Lapierre came back to Ivanovic with the wildcard offer — which she promptly told him, in so many words, to stick up his ass.

“Overall it was very difficult because of the conditions,” said Jankovic of the rain. “I came here around 9 in the morning. To be waiting around in the locker room, it’s really not easy. Then you go on the court, and I started pretty well…the conditions were much more different than in the first round when I played, because the court was much slower, the balls were heavier. So overall the play was much, much slower.”