Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova overwhelms Roberta Vinci to enter the quarterfinal – New Haven Open 2011
Russian tennis pro Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova secured a thumping 6-2, 6-4 victory over Roberta Vinci of Italy on Wednesday to book her place in the quarterfinal of 2011 New Haven Open here in New Haven, United States.
Seeded eight at the Women’s Tennis Association tournament, Pavlyuchenkova has looked in decent form since the start of this week. The 20-year-old came back from a set deficit against fellow Russian Vera Dushevina in her opening
match on Monday. Pavlyuchenkova displayed some high quality tennis in her second round match as she required 1 hour and 17 minutes dispatching Roberta Vinci
In the quarterfinal, Pavlyuchenkova will be taking on the French Open champion Li Na. Na, who is seeded third at the competition, thrashed out Maria Kirilenko in the second round to book her place in the last eight. Ranked 18th in
the world, Pavlyuchenkova possesses a powerful forehand shot and she can play it very deep to create all sorts of problems for her opponents on faster surfaces.
With her victory, the Russian also improved her head-to-head record against Vinci to 5-1. She will be hoping to maintain her current level of play over the next few days to win the fourth WTA title of her career. If she can bring
more consistency into her game play, she certainly has the chance of breaking into top 10 for the first time in her career.
Looking very solid right from the start of the match, Pavlyuchenkova broke the serve in the very first game of the opening set to dent her opponent’s confidence levels. Hitting her powerful and well placed forehand and backhand
winners all over the court, she looked in complete control of the situation. Converting most of the point son her serve, the Russian had no problems holding on to her serve games as she took a very healthy lead in the set. Breaking her opponent for the third
time at 5-2, she took the set score lead 1-0.
Vinci produced a much better performance in the following set. Breaking her opponent early, she managed to shift the balance of the match. However, Pavlyuchenkova also raised the level of her game and she made double serve break
to take 5-4 lead, serving for the set. Firing a blistering serve ace at 40-15 on her next service game, she completed her straight sets victory.
Pavlyuchenkova, however, must work hard on her service as she may not get away with her unforced errors against other high profile players at the tournament. Making six double faults, she needs a bit more consistency in this area
of the game.
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