Daniela Hantuchova battles past Romina Oprandi in the second round at Internazionali BNL d’Italia
Former top five, Slovak Daniela Hantuchova downed Italian Romina Oprandi in straight sets on Wednesday. She registered 7-5, 6-1 victory over the 25-year-old Italian to advance into the third round of the 2011 Internazionali BNL
d’Italia, a WTA Premier 5 event.
The Slovak is in good form this season so far and recreated her magic at Pattaya where she won the title. Her form dipped afterwards as she suffered early round exits. However, the Slovak made it past the first round here as she
dumped Bulgarian Tsvetana Pironkova.
World number 33 Hantuchova downed the Italian, ranked 52 places below her, in two hour and five minutes with a breadstick. They were facing each other for the first time here at Foro Italico and after winning the match, the Slovak
took a lead in her head-to-head series by 1-0 against Oprandi.
28-year-old raged into the opening set and unleashed blistering forehands to reel off first three games in a row. Although she lost her serve in the ninth game but broke the youngster’s serve again in the last game to clinch the
set with a 7-5 win.
The Slovak saved four out of five breakpoints faced and converted two out of nine breakpoint opportunities to her advantage to win easily. She produced a higher first serve share but earned a convincing 59 percent win on it.
Hantuchova kept momentum rolling into the final set and held her serve plausibly in the first game. After Oprandi held her serve in the second game, the Slovak went on savage mode and unleashed flurry of groundstrokes to win next
five games in a row to earn a breadstick.
She saved both breakpoints conceded and converted both breakpoint opportunities to her advantage. Hantuchova also smashed two aces and registered an amazing 79 percent win on her higher first serve share.
Next up for the Slovak is another Italian Francesca Schiavone. The second seed also earned a breadstick in her previous match to reach this spot on Tuesday. Schiavone converted four out of eight breakpoint opportunities to her
advantage to register a 6-3, 6-1 win over the American qualifier Christina McHale in one hour and twelve minutes.
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