Alexandra Panova battles past Jarmila Gajdosova to clear first round – Tashkent Open 2012
World number 89, Alexandra Panova, survived the first round scare against the 117th ranked Aussie starlet, Jarmila Gajdosova, to stay alive in the Tashkent Open tournament at Uzbekistan. She lost the opening battle 4-6
but bounced back emphatically well to win the following two with the scores of 6-2 and 7-5 respectively.
A gruelling battle of two hours and 15 minutes was witnessed at the hard courts of Tashkent. Ironically, it was the first encounter between the two contestants so there were no mind games into play. A traditional start with a mere
one bad game for the Russian forced her down in the opening set. However, she regrouped and fought back well enough to keep her hopes alive in the tournament.
Both players capitalized on their serves in the first four games of the match. It looked there will be no test from either side but a sudden outbreak and shift in the strategy of the Aussie player earned the first breakpoint of
the match. She squandered two opportunities earlier in the game but that didn’t cost a lot. A battle was on in the following game to win the breakpoint back but the Aussie player managed to hang on and protect her breakthrough.
No drama was witnessed in the following four games of the set except one close game for Gajdosova. She won the first set and hinted at a possibility of an upset for the seventh seeded superstar. Trailing one set down, the Russian
consolidated herself and came back as a better player; won the first breakpoint in the second game and allotted no opportunity at all to her rival to bounce back into the set. Another breakpoint for the 23-year-old Russian rounded off the second set in her
favour.
The 89th ranked Russian commenced the final set with a serve hold and so did her competitor. However, the 25-year-old Aussie sneaked a breakthrough in the third game and protected her with a serve hold. Panova turned
the tables on her rival in the sixth game and levelled the scores at 3-3. She had an upper hand in the set and won another breakpoint in the 12th game to dispatch the Aussie.
Next up for the Russian is the winner of the contest between Julia Cohen and Misaki Doi.
Tags: