Marina Erakovic

Marina Erakovic ( Marina Eraković ; born 6 March 1988) is a retired tennis player from New Zealand.

She also made her debut in the main draws of Grand Slam tournaments, reaching the second round at the Australian Open and the third round at Wimbledon, the latter being a first for a New Zealand player since 1988.

Erakovic's performance at Wimbledon was a key factor in her year-end world ranking of No. 66.

Her season, however, was impacted by a hip injury, causing her to miss the French Open and withdraw from Wimbledon.

By the end of the year, her ranking had fallen out of the Top 200.

Erakovic competed in singles and doubles at the Auckland Open, losing in the first round in both events.

She then competed at the Australian Open, losing to eventual semi-finalist Li Na in the first round.

At the Auckland Open, she reached the semifinals, marking the first time a New Zealander had advanced this far in the event since 1990.

Erakovic became the first player from New Zealand to win a Grand Slam title (singles or doubles) since James Greenhalgh and Steven Downs won the boys' doubles in 1993 at the French Open and Wimbledon.

Born in Split, Croatia (then part of Yugoslavia), Erakovic emigrated with her family to Auckland, New Zealand in 1994 at the age of 6.

She attended St Thomas's Primary School and Glendowie College in Auckland.

Erakovic and Monica Niculescu were the runners-up of Victoria Azarenka and Olga Govortsova in the 2004 Wimbledon girls' doubles, before Erakovic teamed with Michaëlla Krajicek to win the US Open title three months later, beating Niculescu and her Romanian teammate Mădălina Gojnea.

Erakovic then partnered Azarenka to an easy win in the 2005 Australian Open over Nikola Fraňková and Ágnes Szávay, and reunited with Niculescu to be runners-up at Wimbledon, defeated this time by Azarenka and Szávay.

In 2005 and 2006, Erakovic won five ITF singles titles.

She was a wildcard entry in the 2005 ASB Classic in Auckland where she lost in the second round.

She lost again in the second round of qualifying for the 2006 French Open.

In 2007, she also lost in the second round of qualifying for the Australian Open, the first round of qualifying for the French Open, the first round of qualifying for Wimbledon, and the third round of qualifying for the US Open.

She was a wildcard entry in the Auckland Open where she was defeated in the second round.

At the end of 2007, aged 19, Erakovic became New Zealand number 1 and ranked No. 153 in the WTA rankings.

In 2008, Marina Erakovic made significant strides in her tennis career.

She qualified for Wimbledon, where she beat Chang Kai-chen in the first round, her first singles Grand Slam win since the Australian Open in 2009.

However, she lost to Daniela Hantuchová in the second round.

At Stanford, Erakovic had the biggest win of her singles career, defeating top-seed and then-world No. 4, Victoria Azarenka, in the second round to reach the quarterfinals.

In the US Open, she was defeated in the first round by Mirjana Lučić after coming through three rounds of qualification.

Erakovic made her first WTA Tour final at the Challenge Bell in Quebec City.

To reach the final, she defeated Caroline Garcia, Irina Falconi, top seed Daniela Hantuchová and defending champion Tamira Paszek.

In the final, she lost to Barbora Záhlavová-Strýcová.

This very good year made her quickly climb back to No. 61.

At the Australian Open, Erakovic beat Irena Pavlovic in the first round and lost to Christina McHale in the second, in three sets.

In the doubles, she and her partner Chuang Chia-jung were eliminated in the first round.

In May at the Italian Open, Erakovic had one of the biggest wins of her singles career defeating world No. 13, Sabine Lisicki, in the first round.

Earlier, she had lost in the semifinals to Elena Vesnina at the Budapest Grand Prix, WTA International tournament in Hungary.

In doubles, she and partner Casey Dellacqua lost to 11th seeded Russian pair Alla Kudryavtseva and Ekaterina Makarova in the first round.

Erakovic's next tournament was the Pattaya Open where she again lost in the first round of the singles, however, she and partner Tamarine Tanasugarn won the doubles title, Erakovic's fourth.

She started the year with the Auckland Open where she again received a wildcard entry, and lost in the first round against Elena Vesnina.

She then competed on the ITF Circuit where she won three titles.

In the Australian Open, she defeated Irena Pavlovic in the first round of qualifying draw, but lost to Kurumi Nara.

Erakovic took part in the French Open where she won three straight matches in the qualifying draw against Ajla Tomljanović, Kurumi Nara and Petra Cetkovská, qualifying her for the main draw.

In the first round, she lost to Arantxa Rus.

She achieved career-high rankings of 39 in singles and 25 in doubles, and has won a singles title, at Memphis in February 2013, and eight doubles titles on the WTA Tour.