Well here's another update on the two ATP/WTA events, the Barcelona Open for the men's tour, and the Porsche Grand Prix Tennis tournament from Stuttgart for the ladies.
Starting quickly with the men there was Andy Murray out first who played against the Colombian qualifier, Santiago Giraldo, who is something of a clay court speciliast. However the Colombian didn't really show many signs of that as Andy thoroughly outplayed Giraldo, with another mighty impressive performance on the clay in Barcelona, as he dispatched his opponent with much ease in 6-1, 6-2, breaking twice in both sets, although he did allow Giraldo to break back at one point in the 2nd, but it was short lived and Andy went on to close the match out.
This really was a very impressive effort from Andy, and it was also a big improvement on service as despite a small wobble in the 2nd set where he dropped serve, his 1st serve percentage was about 63% for the match, which is really good. So tomorrow Andy will face a tougher challenge as he will take on the big serving Canadian, Milos Raonic, who is working his way up the ranks, now at No.25. Raonic just dispatched the Spaniard Nicholas Almagro there in straight sets 6-3, 6-3, so it shows his potential, and I'm sure he will prove to be a very dangerous opponent for Andy, and its also their first meeting, so it will be very tough, however Andy should hopefully come through it (well he better!). But so far Andy has made a fine start to his campaign in Barcelona, and it looks so far like he is starting adjust nicely to the change of surface on the clay, so here's hoping he continues his potentially good run on the red dirt.
In other matches Rafa took on a player Robert Farah, who put in a spirited effort, as the pair of them had several tight close deuce games in both sets, but ultimately Rafa made the breakthrough and closed the match out in 6-2, 6-3. This was a pretty gutsy effort from a player ranked in the top 300, and Farah put on a performance that to an extent belied his ranking, but there was no doubt the king of clay would make it through. David Ferrer breezed past Albert Montanes in their match as he gubbed his fellow Spaniard, 6-0, 6-2, and Janko Tipsarevic also eased past the Portuguese player Frederico Gil in 6-2, 6-2. This result with set up a quarter final match for Rafa with Tipsarevic which promises to be a very good one, but no doubt the king of clay will come out on top, as he has lead their head to head 2-0.
So that's it for the men for just now, now onto the ladies tennis from Stuttgart, where there were plenty of the top seeds in action today. Starting off with Marion Bartoli, the World No.7, who played against the very talented German player (there are alot of Germans in this event!) Mona Barthel, who actually made Bartoli look very ordinary and almost dazed out on court how to deal with her, which lead to an upset victory of 6-3, 6-1, which so far ranks as the best win of Barthel's career. After that Sam Stosur played the defending champion, Julia Goerges, who naturally was feeling a touch of nerves in the 1st set as she was broken twice, but in the 2nd, Julia fought back to take it, guaranteeing a double break. But in the 3rd set, Stosur got the crucial break and served superbly to secure her first win over Julia in their three meetings, winning 6-2, 2-6, 6-3. Next up was the return of the world no.1 Victoria Azarenka, who played her first clay court match against the German No.1 player, Andrea Petkovic, who recently returned to the sport after a back inury. However after dropping the 1st set and fighting back from a break down in the 2nd to make it 4-4 all, Petko twisted her ankle and unfortunately had to retire from the match, which was a great shame as up that point it was a high quality, hard fought encounter. And Victoria was very supportive and decent in helping Andrea off the court, as clearly her ankle had swollen up from the fall, which is a real shame and here's hoping she recovers soon.
And so finally onto the last match of the day which was between the fast rising and highly talented German player, Angelique Kerber, and the former World No1, Caroline Wozniacki. Kerber two weeks ago won against Caroline for the first time in her career in Copenhagen at the E-Boks open, and in this match she obviously was in a winning frame of mind, as she taught the Wozza a lesson in how to play tennis. Caroline fighting as hard as she could wasn't able to break down Kerber's defenses and Kerber pretty much played one of the best matches of her career, hitting winners from all sorts of ridiculous angles and winning points she had no right to win. In the end Kerber closed out the match breaking Wozniacki twice in the 1st and 2nd set with a comprehensive scoreline 6-1, 6-2.
This really was a dismantling of the former world No.1 by Kerber and it was almost shocking to watch Caroline get thumped as much as she did. And it wasn't like Caroline played a bad match, she didn't, she was just thoroughly outplayed, outhit and outdone by a player who right now is playing her best tennis. And to be fair Caroline did try her best to take it to Kerber and play aggressive, but it just didn't come off on this occassion. So I really think its time Caroline went back to the drawing board and try to make adjustments to her game, as right now, quite a few players like Kerber, are just hitting right through her. And one of the Eurosport commentators, the former ladies World No.5, Joe Durie, made an excellent point, that Caroline should try and makes changes to her game, step up the aggression, and even if it makes her ranking drop, then try and work with those changes until she gets them right, and then try and work her way back up the rankings again. It would make more sense to do that, as right now if she carries on like this, she will drop very soon out of top 10 into even maybe the top 20 or 30 by the end of the year! And more to the point Caroline will end up swapping ranks with Kerber way before long, who is not far off the top 10 with the tennis she has been playing.
And Caroline who was the top seed in the Copenhagen open two weeks, failed to win there against Kerber, who is ranked No.14 in the world, and just shows you, how much she is struggling to win a title just now even against players ranked lower than her in the top 20. Its almost like unless she can play in tournaments that don't have players like Goerges, Sharapova, Kerber or any other big hitter, then doesn't have a chance of winning. But anyway that's something Caroline will need to work on throughout the year, as it stands for now, her title drowt will continue until she get's it right.
So that's it for now, more great matches to follow tomorrow, particularly from the ladies, with Radwanska taking on Li Na (should be good!), Victoria Azarenka playing Mona Barthel (yep another cracker in the offing!), Petra Kvitova vs Angelique Kerber and Sam Stosur vs Maria Sharapova. So not too shabby a line-up!
More to follow after this.
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