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We see London, we see France, where is Venus' underpants?

That's likely what crowds at the Australian Open have been asking themselves since tennis legend Venus Williams took to the court and appeared to flash her backside last week.

However, the 29-year-old star was quick to put any rumors to rest via Twitter.

"I am wearing undershorts the same color as my skin, so it gives the slits in my dress the full effect!" she wrote on Thursday.

For the last few days during the tournament, Venus has donned a bright green one-piece, with undergarmets that match her dark skin. This sparked debate online that she had elected to battle her opponents commando style.

"Please put on some decent panties. I do not watch tennis to see your exposed buttocks!" wrote one fan on her website, venuswilliams.com.

Reaction to the ensemble has been mixed, based on the posts.

"I just love her dress it has flare and it has imagination," wrote "margaret joyce." However, "Susan A. Yeck" had a different reaction.

"Your choice of outfit at a Grand slam tournament (or any tournament) was disgusting," she posted. "People really do not want to see your body parts exposed."

Although the mixed response may have come from the illusion she was naked, photos (like the one above) clearly show she was thoroughly covered. Venus indicated via Twitter that she was pleased with her choice to wear the outfit.

"My dress for the Austrailian Open has been one of my best designs ever! Its all about the slits and V-Neck," she wrote.

Whatever she may wear, the famous sibling has been burying her opponents at the Grand Slam of Asia/Pacific. She defeated Casey Dellacqua on Saturday in the second set.

Venus will play along side her sister on Sunday against Andrea Hlavackova and Lucie Hradecka.

Source: Dailynews

Alex Kay has the chance to interview Vera Zvonareva and this is what the Russian has to say...

On kicking on from reaching her first Grand Slam in Australia: I’m not really thinking about it. I’m trying to improve no matter what, I have lots of room for improvement but I’m always confident in myself. I’ve got a lot more experience now and I’m a more mature player.

On how long Russia can continue to produce top players: There are quite a few good juniors coming up but also, if you look at all of us, Dinara is only 22; Elena Dementieva is 27 and probably has a couple more years to play; Svetlana is 23; I’m top 10 and I’m 24 and then there are a few other players and they’re all younger than 25, so I’m sure we will see lots of Russians in the next year or two. But we also have people like Ksenia Pervak, who won the Junior Australian Open final (against Laura Robson).

On why Russian tennis became so strong: Tennis became so popular thank to Boris Yeltsin. We had such a great champion in Yevgeny Kafelnikov and then Anna Kournikova was one of the first ones on the female side. Then it was Anastasia (Myskina) and Elena coming up and lots of girls were practising with them, growing up looking up to them. They started to believe in themselves more, thinking they deserved to be out there as well. We challenged each other a little bit, which helped each other to improve because we practised with each other, we trained in the same facilities and it just made us better and better.

On developing kids: We have lots of great kids' coaches. We don’t have so many Russian coaches working with the professional players on the tour but I think we have great coaches for the kids. They see the talent, work with them, so we get a lot of great juniors but after that everyone makes their own way. Tennis is not cheap, you need money and facilities so lots of juniors are then forced to move somewhere else. So I stayed in Russia when I was young and then I practised over in the US when I was 16 or 17 for quite a while.

On tennis and the credit crunch: I think it might make it a little bit more difficult because to create a good player you need lots of sponsorship for most kids. Most parents can’t afford it because you have to travel, you have to compete, you have to get the experience. It will make it difficult but if we have lots of talent and lots of kids playing tennis, the challenge itself will still produce lots of good players.

On the difficulties of success at Wimbledon: It’s very tough to make Wimbledon a priority. Of course it’s a Grand Slam and of course I want to do as well as possible out there because I love the tournament, but I only get the chance to play one tournament on grass before Wimbledon and I really never get the chance to practise on the grass courts. If you look at my whole career, you can literally county how many weeks I’ve played on grass. It would be something like 20 weeks in total throughout my career since I was six years old. It’s not enough so it’s very difficult to produce your best tennis. But I will try to maybe change my preparation because Wimbledon is a special tournament. It’s not only a Grand Slam, it’s something with so many traditions that I have been watching on TV since I was a kid.

Compulsory Dance
Jana Khokhlova and Sergei Novitski are Russian ice dancers and the 2008 World bronze medalists. They ended the night with 203.26 points. The compulsory dance was to the "Argentine Tango."

For their original dance, they skated to "Two Guitars" by Paul Mauriat, a Russian Gypsy Dance.

Instead of Russian Gypsy, these costumes remind me more of "carribean-flamenco" style. The bright pink, orange, and green reminds me of a luau and the flower patterns remind me of a Hawaiian theme style.

The good: the fringes and the black relates to the music. The bad: the color, the style, Sergei's covered boots, and so on. I don't mind the color, it brightens up the costume, but it doesn't relate very well to the music. Jana's dress (if you can call it a dress) is very busy and very revealing. The cut-outs in the bodice is not bad, but it's barely a dress. The skirt is busy with fringes, flower-patterned shawl, and etc. And why is there a fabric wrapped around her arm?

With Sergei's costume, it's ugly. I get that he's matching his partner's costume, but what is with the big flower all over the right side of his shirt?! And his shirt is way too low (button them up a bit). The black boots over the skates make him look like a pirate!

Overall, I give it 1/2

Free Dance

For their free dance, they skated to "A Night on Bald Mountain" by Modest Mussorgski and "In The Hall of the Mountain King from Peer Gynt" by Edvard Grieg.

He's suppose to be a demon and she's a witch. The costume, like the music, is very "Halloween-like" and very theatrical and "costume-ish." On the other hand, the style of these costumes is very busy and distracting.

Jana's dress (again if you would call it as a dress) has a lot going on. Some details I like are the designs on the dress such as the spider webs to personify her character. But I feel like pieces are going to fall off as she skates (it happened to Sergei once with the million frills he's wearing).

Like Jana, Sergei's costume is very busy. He's wearing more frills than any of the ladies in these competitions. I hate the blue and red strands on his pants that cover his boots. But his scruffy look and his long hair depicts his character very well.

One year is over and the new one begins. Just as quickly the build-up starts for the first Grand Slam event of the year. There are a lot of questions to ponder regarding this year’s Australian Open.

Defending champion, Rafael Nadal, isn’t heading into the tournament in the best of form and tennis betting isn’t sure what to make of him. It is quite crazy – 12 months ago he was just about invincible and how he is plagued by injury and self-doubt.

Similarly Roger Federer isn’t the same juggernaut he once was. Yes he played in all four Grand Slam finals last year but only won two of those most notably the US Open last time up to Juan Martin del Potro.

That leaves the question – how open is the men’s tournament? In previous years have sprung up surprise finalists be it Marcos Bagdhatis, Petr Korda or Thomas Johansson. Those last two actually won the tournament and never did anything else of note.

On the women’s side of things, the big question will be how Serena Williams fares. She came under huge scrutiny following her meltdown at the US Open.
Also there is the return of Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters. The two played in the 2004 decider which Henin won in three sets. You would think this places extra pressure on the likes of Dinara Safina, Ana Ivanovic, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Caroline Wozniacki, Elena Dementieva and Maria Sharapova.

The two Belgian players are really the only two who seems to not to crumple into a ball of nerves when playing one of the Williams sisters.
From a local perspective, again the best and probably only hope is Lleyton Hewitt. The problem for him is his age and injuries. He doesn’t look to have what it takes to make it deep into a Grand Slam. Also the draw doesn’t seem to do him any favors. There is Jelena Dokic but she doesn’t seem to be in the same groove as she was last year when she made it as far as the quarter-finals.

We shall see. As usual it will be a fantastic two weeks of tennis.

David Wiseman writes for this blog and the Australian Open.

TWO things made everyone sit up and take notice of young Russian Maria Kirilenko on Rod Laver Arena yesterday.

Firstly, she beat 2008 Australian Open champion and former world No 1 Maria Sharapova in straight sets in the opening match of the tournament.

Secondly, she created a sensation with the simple gesture of putting her finger to her lips late in the third set.

Was she trying to quieten down the rallying cries from the crowd for Sharapova to keep fighting? After all, Sharapova had crawled back from 4-1 down to 5-4 and only had to hold serve in the 10th game to get back on level pegging at 5-5.

But it was not to be. Sharapova was down two match points on her own serve and after saving one, she sent a cross-court forehand over the sidelines to hand victory to her 22-year-old compatriot and friend 7-6 (7-4) 3-6 6-4 in three hours and 21 minutes.

If they'd stayed on court 13 minutes longer they would have broken the Chanda Rubin-Arantxa Sanchez Vicario record from 1996 of the longest women's singles match in Australian Open history.

As it was, all everyone wanted to know was why Kirilenko had put her fingers to her lips.

Countrywoman Svetlana Kuznetsova thought she was mimicking Russian soccer player Andrei Arshavin, who was part of Arsenal's 2-0 win over Bolton in English Premier League action earlier yesterday.

"It's unbelievable. I got so many questions in the locker room, in the players' lounge. What did you do? What does it mean?" Kirilenko said.

"I don't know. Everyone can think what does that mean. Normally, it was for me actually, that everything is calm, you know."

The 22-year-old has a mature head on her shoulders.

She knows there will be much fuss made of her second career win over Sharapova (the other was in Beijing in 2005) but she is a realist.

"It's a great win, but it's only the first round I pass. It's like nothing big happens," she said.

But the 1700-plus media contingent was intrigued whether Sharapova's shoulder surgery, which forced her to miss the 2008 US Open and 2009 Australian Open, was still not giving her enough consistency on what used to be one of her weapons.

"I served big when I had to. I served big second serves," Sharapova said, rebuffing that line of questioning.

"You know, if I'm going to serve at that pace and do it for three hours and make those types of mistakes, then I'm okay with it."

Sharapova also dished out nine aces to Kirilenko's one, although she gave away 11 free points through double faults.

Sharapova also made an uncharacteristic 77 unforced errors.

"Just didn't win the match. You know, bottom line," Sharapova said when asked what went wrong.

The Kirilenko camp will be riding high, especially boyfriend Igor Andreev, who is set to play his first-round match today against world No 1 Roger Federer.

"He had Federer and I have Sharapova. I think before the matches he said that we can start the year like loud," she said laughing. "And I already start the year loud, I think. So now, his turn."

Earlier another Russian winner, Dinara Safina had to defend her 2009 season, which started with a humiliating 78-minute loss to Serena Williams in the Australian Open final and ended with severe back pain at the WTA Championships in Doha.

"It was still a great season. You know, I didn't make a grand slam (win) but I still won big tournaments," Safina said after defeating Slovakia's Magdalena Rybarikova 6-4 6-4. "So, you know, every year I'm doing better. So why I even have to be sad or something?"

What will make Safina even more happier is Sharapova's exit. The pair was destined to meet in the fourth round. However, another Russian is lurking, French Open champion Kuznetsova, who swatted away Russian-turned-Australian citizen Anastasia Rodionova 6-1 6-2.

Source :

theaustralian

Shoes, pause think about this, are shoes merely what we put on our feet, or are they more? Can shoes represent our mood, and where we have been? Well certainly if our shoes are muddy, then yes they do tell where we have been, we have been somewhere in the mud!! I really do think that they represent our mood quit frequently. If you are feeling fun and flirty, maybe a nice wedge would be the choice. Perhaps a pair like this.

Not that kind of probed. Caroline Wozniacki is being probed for gambling allegations that she retired from a match purposely.

At the Luxembourg Open Wozniacki was playing Anne Kremer a player who was from Luxemboug. Wozniacki who has been hampered by injuries the last month was in control of the match and cruising to an easy win. She had won the first set 7-5 and was up 3-0, but she was still struggling with her injuries. In the WTA on-court coaching is allowed in the smaller events. During the 3-0 change over her father came onto the court and talked to her in, and in Polish told her to retire. He knew that she wouldn't be able to play in the next round the very next day, and didn't want to jeopardize their chances at this weeks WTA Championships in Doha, Qatar. Wozniacki did not retire, but continued to play until the next changeover where she was up 5-0 and one game away from winning. At that time she decided to do what she thought was good sportsmanship and retire, and let the native girl from Luxembourg continue to the next round because she knew she wouldn't be able to play, so why not let her have a chance.

The whole gambling conspiracy comes that all of a sudden a bunch of money began to be placed on Anne Kremer in this match. Its kind of odd for a player getting handily beaten with basically no chance of winning barring a miracle would get so much money placed on them at this point of the match. Its just weird and seems awfully fishy. Reports are that when the Wozniacki's dad came down to talk her into retiring he was overheard by television microphones. Which probably was the main root of all the money being placed on Kremer. I believe that this is what happened.

So the probing continues and Wozniacki has a distraction at this weeks Championships. She will probably be cleared of any wrong-doing, and there will be no more investigations. Hell if Davydenko can get away with it, I cannot see how Wozniacki will be served with any type of penalty.

So get off this girls back. She was trying to do the "right" thing and let a player who is actually from Luxembourg take her place, because she could not play on in the tournament. It was a kind gesture that seemed to turn against her. I know this may be crazy, but lets look at how the gambling process goes. Who lets people bet on tennis after the match has started? Thats like saying I want to put money on the Yankees when they are up 10-3 with 2 outs in the 9th inning. How about this logical idea. ONCE A MATCH HAS STARTED NO MORE ACTION WILL BE TAKEN. That just might cut down on all these gambling and fixed matches conspiracy theories....It's just a thought.

And the curse of Verdasco's weiner continues.....

get well soon Caro.

Kournikova wallpaper

Anna Kournikova

Anna Kournikova hot

Anna Kournikova wallpaper

Anna Kournikova wallpaper

I have posted the Golf Clothing for men in early of the week, now I am sharing some clothing tips with readers who addicted to tennis. Basically the style found in tennis clothes is not just based on being fashionable. A lot of the design of the modern tennis clothes is based on allowing the tennis players to move in a fluid, free motion. In fact, modern tennis clothes are designed to allow athletes to feel unencumbered as they jump, twist, cut, and swing simultaneously in various combination. This is why modern tennis clothes fit well, yet loosely. They are lightweight and don't hold moisture. This also helps keep the tennis players dry and cool. There was a time when selecting tennis clothes was quite a simple endeavor; the tradition of wearing tennis whites made the selection process quite streamlined. However, as anyone who follows tennis knows, the days of watching Martina Navratilova or Jimmy Connors take the court wearing all white are long gone, and today's game is one that embraces fashion forward styles and functional fabrics. Today's best players, like Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova, are often seen in apparel that spans the spectrum of color and fashion; not surprisingly, the rest of the tennis world has followed suit. As I mentioned above, those performance fabrics – like polyester, nylon, and spandex - breathe unlike traditional textiles allowing you to stay cool and dry even during the height of summer. Further, these high tech fabrics hold their shape and color much better than their cotton counterparts, allowing you to look good before, during, and after your match, and their high durability will allow you to continue to look good in the future. While there is nothing wrong with wearing traditional whites to the court, proper tennis attire now includes bright colors and prints which continue to gain popularity at all levels of the game. Style and form are important considerations when selecting tennis apparel, but one should be careful not to ignore function as well as the traditions of the game. Tennis Warm-Up OutfitAll tennis players should own a proper warm-up outfit, which is typically a two piece suit consisting of long pants and a long sleeved top. A warm-up outfit helps the athlete stay warm and get loose before a match, and it is also the traditionally preferred attire for arrival at the court. Tradition also holds that warm-up suits should be removed during the actual match unless it happens to be a very cold day.

During a match, men should wear tucked shirts and tennis shorts, although more and more the untucked look is becoming a presence in professional and amateur tennis. Women should wear short sleeved or sleeveless shirts paired with skirts or skorts – shorts that have styling that resembles a traditional skirt. It is important to note that the traditional tennis attire is still alive and well in some places, particularly at some tennis and country clubs. If you are invited to play as a guest at a club, check with the club or your host in order to be certain that your tennis clothes are appropriate and fitting with their dress code. Tennis Shoes - SneakersNo tennis outfit is complete without the ever important accessories. Tennis shoes should be sneaker style, and it is probably best to purchase sneakers that are specifically designed for tennis. Not only will true tennis shoes perform better, they will not have black or dark colored soles which are banned at many courts due to their tendency to leave dark scuffs on the playing surface. Make sure you complement your tennis outfit with fashionable socks as well as things like headbands, hats, or wristbands; all of which will help keep your face and hands dry and ready for action. Until then, enjoy your game while maintain the style

Gabrielle Reece (Born 1970 in LaJolla, CA) is a professional Volleyball player, Actress, Model, and ESPN Sports Announcer. She has appeared in the movie “Gattaca” with Ethan Hawke and Jude Law, and on the TV shows “8 Simple rules”, “The Tyra Banks show”, “America’s Next Top Model”, “Extreme Home Makeover Edition”, and has appeared on numeous magazine covers including “LIFE”, “PLAYBOY”, “ELLE”, and others. She is also a spokesperson for NIKE. In 1989, ELLE Magazine named her as one of the five most beautiful women in the world.