Upset of the day
Last year’s quarterfinalist Shuai Zhang is the upset of the day so far, losing to American Alison Riske in a close 6-7(7) 6-4 1-6 match. Zhang has been dealt very tough draws in the lead-up, losing closely to Cibulkova and Bouchard. This caused a lack of wins, which caused a lack of confidence for the Chinese player coming into the tournament. Riske had the exact opposite, as she reached the finals of Shenzhen, beating Radwanska on the way, her confidence was very high. Both players had a straight set win in the first round, Riske beat Brengle, and Zhang outclassed Sasnovich. Riske looked able to pull off the upset from the start, but failed to serve out the set at 5-4. The match went into a dramatic tiebreak taken by Riske. Zhang was very aggressive in the second set, when at one point, Riske had won only 9% of points after her second serve. In the deciding set, Riske just ran away with the match and advanced into third round. The American’s next opponent will be 10th seed Carla Suarez Navarro or Sorana Cirstea.
Main favorites are through
The highest seed not to be written about so far is 8th seed Svetlana Kuznetsova. The Russian has been a beast so far, losing only 1 game to Duque-Marino in her first round, and beat Australian wild card Jaimee Fourlis 6-2 6-1 in Round of 64. Kuznetsova looks in good form at Australian Open so far, but she is yet to face a Top 100 player. She will get that opportunity in her next match, where in the 13th match of their 6-6 rivalry, Kuznetsova will face former No. 1 Jelena Jankovic. The Serb has had a much harder road, first grinding out a win over 27th seed Laura Siegemund, and today winning over another dangerous German, Julia Goerges. If Goerges gets the opportunity, she can take the match from her opponents, but Jankovic was able to prevent that today with a 6-3 6-4 win. 11th seed Elina Svitolina was also blessed with a pretty easy draw, yet to face a Top 100 player. Today it was a win over Julia Boserup of the United States that put her through to the 3rd round, 6-4 6-1. Svitolina has set up a 3rd round match against 24th seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. This match ought to test them both, as the Russian also didn’t have the toughest second round opponent. “Pavs” put on a confident display against her qualifier compatriot Natalia Vikhlyantseva 6-2 6-2. Canadian Eugenie Bouchard is continuing to be in great form from her Sydney semifinal run, and a win 7-6(5) 6-2 win will put her in third round, which was originally projected to be Kasatkina’s spot. Bouchard will next face Coco Vandeweghe or Pauline Parmentier, both unseeded
‘Silent Meldonium vs. Chinese Davenport’ Marathon
With all these matches happening, one would think that the unsuspecting match between Varvara Lepchenko and Ying-Ying Duan would get little to no attention, however, that was not the case. Both players are well-known in the hardcore WTA fandom community, as silent Meldonium and Chinese Davenport. Some believe that Lepchenko’s absence on the tour between February and May 2016 was not due to injury, but that the American was serving a silent ban for taking the infamous substance Meldonium, made famous by Maria Sharapova’s case. Lepchenko has denied these allegations, but the nickname remains. Ying-Ying Duan has come into the public’s knowledge at Wimbledon 2015, where she upset Eugenie Bouchard, No. 12 at the time. She was immediately nicknamed “Chinese Davenport” due to her ability to pull off the upset of her life despite her movement being a bit subpar. The match definitely did not disappoint its spectators around the world, as after splitting sets it went into a third set. Both players started to focus on their service games, and it turned into a 10-8 marathon, out of which Duan came out victorious. In her post-match press conference, Duan was asked about her legendary upcoming opponent, Venus Williams, to which she replied: ‘I’ve never seen her play’
Some doubles for the end
Day 3 marks the start of doubles at Australian Open. Two matches really stood out of the crowd, first was No. 1 seeds Caroline Garcia and Kristina Mladenovic opening against Belinda Bencic and Ana Konjuh. It turned a bit underwhelming, as Bencic/Konjuh played like the singles players they are, and Garcia/Mladenovic played like 1st that they are, and walked away with a 6-1 6-2 win. Other was Sara Errani and Kirsten Flipkens schooling the WTA Rising Stars, the “Dashas” Gavrilova and Kasatkina. Former Doubles World No. 1 and experienced Flipkens won 6-2 6-4. Upset of the day was 6th seeded Chan’s losing to Liang/Yang in straight sets, and newly formed team of Monica Niculescu and Abigail Spears falling Mirjana Lucic-Baroni and Andrea Petkovic 1-6 4-6. The 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th seeds, with 3rd seeds Makarova/Vesnina being pushed to three sets by Aoyama/Ninomiya. American comebackers Liezel Huber and Megan Moulton-Levy both survived the first round, Huber with Maria Sanchez and Moulton-Levy with Lauren Davis.
