Caroline Wozniacki destroys Mona Barthel to advance into the finals – e-Boks Sony Ericsson Open 2011
Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark put in a gritty performance to overcome Germany’s Mona Barthel 6-1, 6-2 in the semi-final of the e-Boks Sony Ericsson Open on Saturday.
The German opened the match nervously, thrashing a number of unforced errors to dump her service game to drop serve and hand Wozniacki an immediate advantage. Barthel fans were sweating as she was unable to find her footing against
the defending champion. However, the German managed to raise the level of her game in the second set, but she could not hold on to her serve and lost the second with the same pattern. From here Wozniacki never looked back and despite an early hiccup in the
second set, never looked likely to drop a set.
Opening serve in the first set, the German committed back-to-back- errors to give the first game to the world number one. The energetic Dane broke the German one after the other to nab a breadstick victory in the first set.
Although she served a single ace in the first set, Wozniacki destroyed the German in every department of the game. Hitting 77 percent of first serves and capitalizing on Barthel’s unforced errors, Wozniacki was able to go one up
in the set score, registering a tremendous 71 percent on her first serve.
Continuing her ascent, Wozniacki broke the German in the first game of the second set to lead 1-0. Although Barthel roared back to level the score at 2-2, this was the last time she found herself on the scoreboard. Reeling off
four straight games, Wozniacki was able to win the second set 6-2 and clinch her straight sets victory.
The world number one made short work of the German, a distant 142 places below her in the rankings, finishing off the semi-final match in just sixty minutes. With this win, the Dane has improved her year-to-date win-loss mark to
41/8 matches.
Wozniacki, who looks determined to retain her e-Boks Sony Ericsson title, will be up against the fourth-seeded Lucie Safarova of Czech Republic in the final. The Czech destroyed Petra Martic of Croatia to make her way into the
final here at the e-Boks Sony Ericsson Open.
Both women will battle it out for the second time in their careers, having already met in the fourth round of 2010 Stuttgart, where Safarova defeated the Dane to hold a 1-0 head-to-head edge. Although Safarova enjoys her recent
performance at the tournament, Wozniacki outmatches the Czech on paper leading in every field. Unless she proves otherwise, Wozniacki is expected to move past Safarova for sure.
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