Safin Leads Deep Wild-Card Group

An impressive group of players has been given wild cards for the upcoming Pacific Life Open at Indian Wells Tennis Garden, ranging from Australian Open finalist Marat Safin of Russia to a resurgent Thomas Enqvist of Sweden.

Others receiving wild cards on the men’s side were Alex Corretja of Spain, a former Indian Wells champion and two-time French Open finalist; Tommy Haas of Germany, who is on the comeback trail after sitting out all of last year because of shoulder surgery; and 20-year-old Alex Bogomolov Jr.

Corretja defeated Enqvist in the 2000 final at Indian Wells.

The men’s event, which features an increased draw of 96 players, will start with first-round, main-draw action on March 12. Men’s qualifying starts Wednesday.

The wild cards for the women’s main draw -- qualifying starts Monday, first-round action on Wednesday, -- are a mixture of youngsters and struggling veterans. Former French Open champion Iva Majoli of Croatia, once ranked as high as No. 4 in the world, is now at 148. Alexandra Stevenson, a Wimbledon semifinalist in 1999, has dropped to 119 and has not won a main-draw match in 2004.

Other berths went to Angela Haynes, Tatiana Golovin of France, 17-year-old Maria Kirilenko of Russia, 15-year-old Viktoriya Kutuzova of Russia and 14-year-old Sesil Karatancheva of Bulgaria.

Two additional slots are to be determined, as are the qualifying wild cards.

Golovin, 16, made an impact as a wild card at the Australian Open, reaching the fourth round before losing to Lisa Raymond, and followed that result by reaching the semifinals in Paris last month. Haynes, 19, who grew up in Compton, qualified for tournaments in Palo Alto and Philadelphia last year and in Memphis this year, losing to Amy Frazier in the first round.

-- Lisa Dillman