Chinese tennis ace Li Na took the country's game to a new high yesterday as she became the first ever Chinese player to break into the group of the world's top 30 players.

The 24-year-old from Wuhan, Hubei Province, climbed up two spots to 30th in the WTA Rankings after a third round finish at the grass-court Edgbaston Open last week, where she lost to Russian Maria Sharapova 6-2, 6-3.

Li is almost certain to be listed as one of the 32 seeds for the first time at Wimbledon, which takes place from June 26 to July 9. Seeding will help her avoid the biggest hitters in the first few rounds at the All-England Club.

"Being a seeded player at Grand Slam events is very important to Chinese as they can avoid taking on top players in the first two rounds and their chances for advancing will be much higher," said China's team manager Jiang Hongwei before the French Open this year. "We always strive for a berth like that before the Grand Slam tournaments."

The previous highest ranking was held by Peng Shuai, who made 31 in August last year after a series of sparkling performances which helped her beat Belgian Kim Clijsters, Anastasia Myskina and Elena Dementieva of Russia.

Li notched up her second doubles title at the WTA Tour DFS Classic yesterday when paired with Jelena Jankovic of Serbia.

But the country's tennis officials said that the celebrations are very much on ice.

"China's women's team has only one goal - the Beijing Olympics," said a spokesman of the Chinese Tennis Association (CTA). "We have to keep on moving up the rankings, so I don't think No 30 is good enough and it's no time for us to get complacent."

The ranking is proof that 2006 has been excellent for China's women's stars so far.

After an injury-plagued 2005 season, Li regained her form by leading the national team past Indonesia in the country's debut tie in the World Group of the Federation Cup in April.

She also had the pleasure of equalling China's best performance at a Tier I singles competition by reaching a semi-final. She also competed in the historic all-Chinese final with teammate Zheng Jie at Estoril.

Meanwhile Zheng and Yan Zi claimed the Australian Open doubles title in January.

Although they cannot challenge the 13 Russians and 11 Americans in the top 100, there are now six Chinese women ranked top 100, with Zheng seven places behind Li and 20-year-old Peng still inside the top 50 at 41.

Yan takes up 80th spot, Yuan Meng is at 99 and Athens doubles' gold medallist Sun Tiantian is ranked No 100.

In the double's rankings, Zheng and Yan both make the top ten at 7th and 9th respectively.

(China Daily June 20, 2006)