Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Ivanovic out in first round of U.S. Open

Last year, when Ana Ivanovic was the top seed at the U.S. Open, she was defeated in the second round. This year, the 11th-seeded Ivanovic lost in the first round to Kateryna Bondarenko, in a third set tiebreak. Ivanovic held a match point in the tiebreak, but could not convert it. Bondarenko double-faulted her first match point, but was able to win the next two points, for a 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 victory.

Also making an exit was 16th seed Virginie Razzano, who was defeated 6-4, 6-3 by the not-to-be-underestimated Yanina Wickmayer.

These were not the only upsets. 27th seed Alisa Kleybanova, who made such a splash in Toronto, was defeated by another big hitter, Petra Kvitova. And 32nd seed Agnes Szavay went out after a defeat by Shahar Peer.

The rest of the day was pretty much business as usual, though some of that business was dramatic. Top seed Dinara Safina staged another heart-stopper, and Sabine Lisicki double-faulted and fooled around enough to stretch her match against Aravane Rezai to three sets. Lisicki has to either stop getting injured (the better option) or learn how to regain her mental strength sooner if she has an injury layoff. Having one of the best serves on the tour is not that much of an advantage if you double-fault 16 times. I hope that Lisicki can play her way into this tournament because right now, she is all over the place.

Melanie Oudin impressed by easily knocking off Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, who also had trouble with her serve. Gisela Dulko enjoyed a hard-fought win over the other young Russian, Ekaterina Makarova. Maria Sharapova (her 2009 U.S. Open night dress is, in my opinion, one of her greatest), easily defeated Tsvetana Pironkova, and Jelena Jankovic, Svetlana Kuznetsova and Elena Dementieva all had straight-set wins.

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