Marina Erakovic's Olympic Games fate is now in the hands of the New Zealand Olympic selectors.
The Olympic committee yesterday received a nomination for the young Aucklander from Tennis New Zealand.
It arrived with impressive timing, on the back of another fine win for the world No 64Erakovic.
Overnight she had thumped the world No 33, India's Sania Mirza, 6-3, 6-0 to make the last 16 of the US$200,000 DFS Classic in Birmingham.
She plays Russian qualifier world No 129 Yaroslava Schvedova overnight, with the prospect of a semifinal against fifth seed Alona Bondarenko of the Ukraine, ranked 29, to follow.
The win over Mirza is sure to bump Erakovic's ranking up to a fresh career high, irrespective of how much further she progresses in the tournament.
The match lasted a little over an hour, Mirza landing just 44 per cent of her first serves, allowing Erakovic to capitalise on her second serve.
The Olympic selectors - NZOC secretary-general Barry Maister, Simon Wickham and Mike Stanley - will deliberate this week with the announcement expected early next week.
TNZ has backed its case for Erakovic to go to Beijing with several arguments:
* That she has risen over 100 places this year.
* She has made two semifinals of WTA Tour events this year.
* She is mixing it successfully with players in or close to the top 10.
* Tennis, as a multi-national professional sport, has higher benchmarks than other sports.
* And TNZ points out that the national women's soccer team got a pass into the Olympics on their potential for London in 2012.
