Petra Kvitova has always been a good hitter, but has tended to be careless. She has steadied herself at Wimbledon, however, and today added another impressive win to her string of Wimbledon upsets (which includes Zheng Jie and Victoria Azarenka) by upsetting 3rd seed Caroline Wozniacki 6-2, 6-0. Kvitova had first and second service win percentages of 86 and 77, she hit 23 winners, and was successful at the net 88% of the time.In contrast, Wozniacki--though she got 79% of her first serves in--won points on only 30% of them. She hit four winners in the entire match, and never saw a break opportunity.
Kvitova, by the way, has finally put on some weight; for a while, she loked like she might blow away.
Top seed Serena Williams faced a determined Maria Sharapova, but she prevailed, 7-6, 6-4. Sharapova held three set points in the first set tiebreak, but could not convert any of them. Williams hit 19 aces, bringing her total at this tournament to 62.
2nd seed Venus Williams, as I predicted, got her most serious challenge today, in the form of Jarmila Groth. It was an enjoyable match, but did not go to three sets, as I thought it might, because Groth eventually had trouble handling the occasion. Williams broke Groth at 4-all in the first set, and then held to win the set. Groth served for the second set at 5-4 and was broken. She served for the again at 6-5 and was broken again. Williams rushed to a quick 4-0 lead in the tiebreak, but Groth caught up with her, only to double-fault at 5-all, giving her opponent a match point. Williams won the match when Groth threw a forehand into the net.
Williams hit 26 winners and made 15 unforced errors. Groth hit 25 winners and made 16 unforced errors. Williams used her experience to win this match, which left Groth looking understandably disappointed. The Australian player has a lot to be proud of, however--coming from out of almost nowhere to reach the round of 16 at both the French Open and Wimbledon. She had a most impressive Wimbledon run.
2 comments:
Wow, Wozniacki did not have a clue this morning. I looked at the match stats for all the players coming into the round of 16 yesterday and I knew that Venus would have a tough match because Groth's first serve percentage was really high.
I also knew that Wozniacki would have it tough as even though she had a high first serve percentage she was not winning a lot of points behind it. That told me that the first serve was not being very effective, but man was Petra hitting the ball this morning or what. She was hitting winners from every angle and you could tell that her team did their homework, especially seeing as they have met earlier this season (think it was at the French).
Maria/Serena - this one lived up to the billing. Is there any player on the WTA tour as mentally tough as Serena. Facing down set points and just keeps coming up with the shots. Credit Maria, she fought hard today and Serena's return was nowhere in sight but Maria played very well.
Could it be that we can have a tour where all the players are healthy. Man, that would be fantastic for women's tennis.
After watching Kvitova in her last match, for me, it was only a question of "Can she stay steady?" She could, and that kind of hitting beats Wozniacki. I didn't expect this much of a beat-down, though.
Serena is on a roll like I haven't seen her on in a while. Nice to see that Maria is slowly coming back, though.
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