Done by John Inverdale in the Telegraph a few day's ago...not available online so I'll type it out:

"
It is Feb 14 and we're 6 weeks into the year. So if you're a professional sportsperson, earnings of $539 must mean that things are a bit tight.

Amanda is ranked no 4 in Britain and 222nd in the world and that's her prize money to date in 2007. If you are the 222nd best hedge fund trader in the world, you probably own half of Africa. If you're the 222nd best tennis player in the world, you are living on a sporting knife-edge every day.

Yesterday in Stockholm, Amanda played the 19 year old German Korina Perkovic who is ranked 370th in the world. Korina lists her interests as shopping and talking to friends. Amanda who is 10 years older has a degree in English and has worked as a teacher. She is married too.

Maybe it's in the genes - her mum Christine Truman got to a Wimbledon final. Amanda missed the buzz of being a 'proper' athlete so having previously hung up her competitive racket, she has gone back onto the tour, more determined than ever. But it's hard.

Stockholm is the 4th leg of a European tour which includes Milan, Tipton and Sutton. "The place in Italy was the worst" recalls Amanda, "They rolled the courts onto the floor of a kids gymnasium and you could hear the bells ringing for class throughout the day. The toilets were indescribable. The same ones that all the kids were using. I don't think any player went for a comfort break during their matches."

No one tends to watch the 'wannabes' of the tennis circuit. "That makes it hard too," Amanda adds. "You're in the middle of Belarus or Poland playing on a court that's 3 or 4 away from the main area and you have to keep telling yourself why you're there.  That this is a job and if you don't buckle down you'll be out and heading for somewhere else the next day."

It's lonely too. Amanda travels with her hitting partner Mark Beim without whom it would be a very solitary life. "I wouldn't exactly call the tour chummy and pally," she says wryly. "it's dog eat dog out there. We're all desperate to get out of this level of competition and move up to the fringe of the top 100. We want to play in events where they actually put you up in hotels and meet you at the airport. Not, as we are at the moment, spending half our time organising how we're going to get somewhere and where we're going to stay."

Airport. Hotel. Practice court. Match. Practice. Hotel. Groundhog day. Even if the hotel is a dump - "just don't get me started on the one we stayed in in Minsk, I had the most horrific bout of food poisoning" Amanda says - the longer you stay there, the better things are because you're still in the tournament.

Amanda wants to be among the world's top 150 by the summer. On present rankings that would take her up to no 2 in Britain.

"People really have no idea how competitive it is" Amanda says, "I'm convinced the difference between being 200 and 100 is largely down to luck. But you need to be higher up the rankings, to get that bit of luck. So you train and you train and you train and every time you set foot on a court, you set yourself targets. When you win, you get a high like no other. That's why I'm out here. There's nothing like it. I do still love the competing even if I am at the last chance saloon.

Amanda waited until 7pm before going on court against the young German. Two hours later she was out, beaten in straight sets. But she is still chasing the dream. Next stop Doha.

"Don't anyone ever say that British players don't want it enough," Amanda says definately. "We all want it desperately. It's just that so many others do as well."