Caroline Wozniacki bows down to Lucie Safarova in round two – Qatar Ladies Open 2012
Lucie Safarova, the Czech tennis icon, ousted the former world number one, Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark, in the second round contest of the Qatar Ladies Open. On Wednesday, both contenders locked horns to contest for almost
two hours and 28 minutes. The final scores were 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(3) in favour of the Czech.
Wozniacki served the first game of the match; bagging it easily with just one point going in favour of the Czech. Safarova also held her serve comprehensively and the match picked up momentum in the meantime. Both players
fought hard for the first nine games; scampering across the courts and covering a lot of distance throughout the rallies.
The Dane was under a bit of pressure in the midst of the set; struggling to hold on to her serve but luckily for her no breakpoints were gifted to the Czech and she survived the crunch situation. Safarova was serving to stay
in the set but her sloppy finishing shots gifted initial two points of the game to the Dane. She fought back to level the points but again committed a sloppy unforced error to allot a breakpoint opportunity to her opponent. The Dane gobbled up the first set
with an eye-startling winner down the line and reversed the pressure on the Czech.
The second set was not different from the first except the only break serve of the set went into the favour of the Czech. The first four games were held by respective serve players; progressing the scores to 2-2. Safarova
broke serve and took the lead that was kept intact until the end of the set. Wozniacki strangled in the second set as she always do and lost it with her opponent lining up another upset of the tournament.
Wozniacki is famous to throttle in the big match situation but this was not the scenario to fall apart so easily. She lost the opening serve game of the final set and looked under pressure. She fought back to level the scores
at 2-2 and continued to capitalize on her serve for the rest of the set. No breakpoints were played in the remaining games with a critical tie-break round brought into play to decide this thriller.
Safarova showed immense courage to stay in the contest after losing the initial mini-break. She trounced the Dane with quality returns and ended the torturous but enthralling match in her favour. She progresses to round three
to play the Russian tennis icon, Svetlana Kuznetsova.
Tags: