Wed Jun 18 11:30:00 2008

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Federer, Ivanovic are top seeds at Wimbledon

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Wimbledon, England (Sports Network) - World No. 1s Roger Federer and Ana Ivanovic have been installed as the top seeds at Wimbledon, which will get underway Monday at the All England Club.

Federer will try to become the first man to capture six straight Wimbledon titles in the Open Era. He equaled Bjorn Borg's long-standing mark of five straight last year at the world's only grass-court major.

The 26-year-old Federer, who is also the reigning four-time U.S. Open champion, owns 12 career Grand Slam titles, only two shy of Pete Sampras' record haul of 14. Sampras tallied seven Wimbledon championships overall, but never more than four in a row.

Federer beat Rafael Nadal in the last two Wimbledon finals.

Ivanovic is the reigning French Open champion and has played in three of the last five major finals on the women's side.

As far as the men's seeds are concerned, Federer is followed by the four-time French Open champion Nadal, Aussie Open titlist Novak Djokovic, Nikolay Davydenko, David Ferrer, two-time Wimbledon runner-up Andy Roddick and 2002 Wimbledon finalist David Nalbandian. Nadal throttled Federer in the finale at Roland Garros earlier this month.

Seeds eight and nine for the men are Richard Gasquet and James Blake, while the 10th seed is Marcos Baghdatis, despite the fact that he's ranked 25th in the world. Baghdatis reached the Wimbledon semifinals in 2006 and the quarters here a year ago.

On the ladies' side, the top-20 seeds are also the top-20 players in the world. Ivanovic is followed by fellow Serb Jelena Jankovic, Aussie Open titlist and former Wimbledon champ Maria Sharapova, U.S. Open runner-up Svetlana Kuznetsova, two-time major finalist Elena Dementieva, two-time Wimbledon winner Serena Williams and defending champion Venus Williams, who beat France's Marion Bartoli in last year's finale at the All England Club. The six-time Grand Slam champion Venus has won the title here on four occasions.

The singles draws will be revealed on Friday.