Dominika Cibulkova has not been in her best form in 2017 so far, with second match losses to Cornet and Bouchard in the lead-up. She also had some struggles against Allertova in her first round. Su-Wei Hsieh had a great end to 2016, when after practically missing half of the year, she won the title at the ITF $100K in Dubai. She lost her first match of the year to Barbara Haas in Brisbane qualifying. The Taiwanese player that hits double-handed shots off of both sides was playing well against Knapp, until the Italian retired from the match. From the beginning, Cibulkova was losing serve, which is nothing new to the No. 6 as she makes up for it on her returning games. The petite Slovak was broken twice, but she broke Hsieh three times and won the first set 6-4.
Second set was a bit more stable, with the first break coming from Cibulkova at 3-2. The Slovak held until she was serving for the match at 5-3. Hsieh made some errors, and suddenly Cibulkova had two match points at 40-15. The Taiwanese played incredibly for the rest of the game, grinding to save those two match points. She showed that she really is a former Top 25 player and that she can play way above her current ranking, which is No. 91. Hsieh and Cibulkova both held pretty easily and the second set headed into a tiebreak. The tiebreak was a mess service-wise, there were almost no holds, but despite that it held together. Cibulkova was once again serving at a match point at 6-5, and Hsieh once again saved it after a long rally. 6-6. Cibulkova had a very strong emotional reaction as she did for the remainder of the set. She successfully set herself up another match point at 7-6, with Hsieh about to serve. The unseeded player kept her cool and got two points off of her serve. After 4 match points, Cibulkova was suddenly saving a set point at 7-8, about which she was not happy about. She saved it with a large “Pome!”, after which an even larger “Pome!” followed two points later. Cibulkova won the second set tiebreak 10-8.
Cibulkova’s opponent in third round will be 30th seed Ekaterina Makarova. The former World No. 8 and past Australian Open semifinalist was facing a player with similar credentials, the former World No. 5 and past Roland Garros finalist Sara Errani. Makarova was the favorite coming into the match, playing in a slightly better form and leading the head-to-head 4-3 before this match, losing only once on hard courts. Makarova was crusing, and at 6-2 3-2 Errani retired from the match in tears due to an unknown injury. Cibulkova has beaten Makarova three times and never lost to her, all matches on hard court. She will be expected to do it again, and make the 4th round to face either Johanna Konta or Caroline Wozniacki.
