Stosur Beats Out Jankovic
In this night session between former champions at Charleston, 6th seed Samantha Stosur met former World No. 1 Jelena Jankovic. This match was a replay of the 2010 Roland Garros semifinal, this time on green clay. Stosur was given a bye in the first round, whereas Jankovic defeated Alexandrova 6-0 6-4. Jankovic came out with a heavily taped thigh and Stosur immediately took notice. Among her many long sliced backhands, she mixed in a drop shot in almost every other rally. This tactic worked brilliantly, and the Australian took the first set 6-1 in just 24 minutes. Beginning of the second set, Jankovic learned to anticipate Stosur’s drop shots, and dominated the game from the baseline. Jankovic also took advantage of her signature shot- backhand down the line. Jankovic took a lead of 3-1, but Stosur started to play her game again and Jankovic slowly fell apart, getting angry with herself, the umpire and everyone else. Stosur won 6-1 6-3 and advances to the Round of 16 against 10th seed Irina-Camelia Begu or Kristina Kucova.
Blast From The Past
34 year-old Anastasia Rodionova has prolonged her surprise singles run in Charleston by one more, defeating Ying-Ying Duan of China 7-6(3) 6-1. The former World No. 62 has played very few singles matches and become more of a doubles specialist in the recent years. Despite her low ranking, Rodionova was well known, actually notorious for her on-court antics and behavior towards other players. This was the third qualifying event Rodionova has entered this year, getting a 1-2 record before Charleston. She defeated seeded opponents in Sachia Vickery and Sesil Karatantcheva, getting through in straight sets. Now she is through to the 2nd round in Charleston, set to face Former World No. 5 Sara Errani. In May, the Australian will celebrate the 20th anniversary since turning pro, and this might be her last notable run at the WTA level in singles.
Dark Day For Americans
Out of the 9 Americans that stepped on court today, only 2 came out victorious, the most notable loser being 14th seed Lauren Davis. Davis has had a great year so far, getting her first title in Auckland, reaching quarterfinals at both Doha and Dubai, and most recently Round of 16 at Indian Wells. This is combined with some lows, like her first round losses at Australian Open and Miami to Samantha Crawford and Varvara Lepchenko. In Charleston, Davis lost to Maria Sakkari of Greece, 5-7 4-6.
Charleston native Shelby Rogers managed to grind out a win for the home crowd against the qualifier Victoria Cepede Royg. The match was interrupted yesterday by the rain, and Cepede Royg came out of the gates stronger today. The Paraguayan developed a lead of 5-1, which was then taken back by Rogers and the first set headed to a tiebreak. The American made several unforced errors on the return, costing her the set. Rogers then found a way to outplay Cepede Royg, and she was up 6-7(1) 6-3 5-1, and it seemed all over. Suddenly, all of Cepede Royg’s flat shots starting to go in, and she managed to put up an incredible fight. Rogers served for the match three times, failing all of them. Match came down to a tiebreak, which was on an incredibly high level, especially for two players outside of the Top 50. Rogers won the tiebreak 8-6, advancing to the second round after 2 hour and 42 minutes.
In an all-American derby, wildcard Bethanie Mattek-Sands defeated qualifer Sofia Kenin 6-4 6-4 in a battle of generations. Kenin was up a break in the second set, and overall showed great promise for the future. Mattek-Sands now set up a match with her doubles partner and good friend Lucie Safarova.
Varvara Lepchenko tried to beat 15th seed Lucie Safarova, and made the Czech come up with her best game to beat her after 2 hours and 52 minutes. Lepchenko took an odd 10 minute off-court break between the second and third set, which particularly baffled Tennis Channel commentator Tracy Austin, who called out for a rule restricting off-court breaks between sets. Safarova came out of this battle of lefties 7-5 6-7(6) 6-3 and will face Mattek-Sands.
Qualifier and birthday girl Asia Muhammad didn’t give herself the ideal gift today as she lost to Hungarian teenager Fanny Stollar 3-6 5-7. With a similar scoreline exited Jennifer Brady, who lost to Mona Barthel 5-7 4-6.
20 year-old Louisa Chirico most likely entered Charleston with an injury, as she lost 9 straight games before retiring to Annika Beck at 0-6 0-3. Lucky loser Grace Min didn’t take advantage of this opportunity as she lost 1-6 1-6 in little over an hour to Sara Errani of Italy. However, this is a slight improvement for the American, as in their last meeting, Errani won 6-1 6-0.
Other Results
In other results, 3 of the remaining 4 seeds advanced, 12th seed Yulia Putintseva being the one who lost. It was an awkward situation, as Putintseva was up 4-0 in the final set before the rain delay. Today, she lost six straight games to Magda Linette, subsequently opting out of the post-match handshake. The head-to-head now goes to 3-0 for Linette, despite their large gap in ranking. 13th seed Shuai Zhang took care of business against Misaki Doi on the green clay, winning 6-2 6-1. In a meeting of two players who are still finding their form in 2017, 10th seed Irina-Camelia Begu went 6-0 6-0 over Cagla Buyukakcay, making her record 3-9 this year. Buyukakcay is still winless, now falling to 0-11 counting Fed Cup. She is also going to defend her title in Istanbul, so it doesn’t look good for the Turkish No. 1. 11th seed Mirjana Lucic-Baroni outlasted qualifier Aleksandra Krunic in three sets 6-1 4-6 6-3, making their head-to-head 1-2.
Unseeded Daria Kasatkina got a good start to her tournament, beating Danka Kovinic 6-1 6-2. In the longest match of the day, Slovakian Kristina Kucova outlasted qualifier Silvia Soler-Espinosa 5-7 7-5 7-6(2) after 3 hours and 10 minutes. Kucova will face 10th seed Begu next.
