Daniela Hantuchova, Flavia Pennetta rally past their opponents at Qatar Ladies Open
Former world number five, Slovakian Daniela Hantuchova made an epic comeback from being one set down to win the match. She defeated Russian Vera Dushevina by 4-6, 6-2, 6-4 at the Doha WTA Premier event on Wednesday.
Both players produced an amazing game of tennis in the opening set. Both fired one ace and although Hantuchova had a higher first serve percentage and saved break points five times but it wasn’t enough to hold the raging Russian
back. Dushevina won the first set by displaying her awesome skills to win six games including two by break points and with an amazing 75 percent win on her first serve.
The frustrating Hantuchova got back to her in the second set. She seemed to re-form herself in this set as she fired three aces, saved three break points and was able to break Russian’s serve three times to clinch the set. The
Slovak registered a lower first serve percentage of 65 percent to Dushevina’s 81 percent. However, she earned an acceptable 59 percent win on it.
In the final set, Hantuchova outshined the Russian in every department of tennis and with a single break of serve, she won the set. She also produced a much better first serve percentage of 67 percent to Dushevina’s 56 percent.
She also registered 77 percent win on it.
Ranked 30th in the world, Hantuchova had won 7 out of her last 10 matches. She recently claimed her first WTA title in three years at Pattaya after defeating 8th seeded Italian Sara Errani with a bagel. Although
she was ousted in the first round at Dubai, she entered this tournament confidently and triumphed over 6thseeded Belarusian Victoria Azarenka in three sets in the first round.
The Slovak will be facing the 2nd seeded Belarusian Vera Zvonareva in the quarter-finals and she has yet to lose a set in this tournament.
In another match on Wednesday, the former top ten, Italian Flavia Pennetta bounced back to win against world number 35, Czech Lucie Safarova in three sets of 4-6, 6-3, 6-4.
Pennetta displayed her amazing skills and with her ferocious ground strokes she clinched the match after losing the first set. Czech hammered more aces i.e. 11 to 6, had a higher return point winning percentage and registered an
equal first serve percentage of 62 percent. But the Italian earned 9 breaks to overpower Safarova.
The higher ranked Italian had an 80 percent winning record for her last ten matches. Before entering this tournament, she reached the semi-finals of Dubai WTA Premier event where she lost to 16th seeded Russian Svetlana
Kuznetsova. She entered this tournament confidently and dumped Chinese Jie Zheng in straight sets out of the tournament.
Pennetta will be facing top seeded Dane Caroline Wozniacki in the next round and she has to practice more to win against the world number one Wozniacki.
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