Dominika Cibulkova topples Anabel Medina Garrigues in round one - Toray Pan Pacific Open 2012
World number 13, Dominika Cibulkova, gusted away the 38th ranked Spaniard, Anabel Medina Garrigues, in the opening round of the Toray Pan Pacific Open on Sunday to commence the campaign in an emphatic fashion. She thrashed
her opponent in an hour and 39 minutes; registering the straight sets score line of 6-3, 7-6(3).
It was the fourth triumph for the 23-year-old Slovak against the Spanish professional. Previously, she had defeated her twice in 2007 and once earlier this year in New Haven Open at Yale. Cibulkova just lost one encounter to the
30-year-old Spaniard at Stockholm in 2007.
So, it’s an emphatic record for the Slovak against the Spanish veteran that obviously helped to stamp her authority in the mind of Garrigues prior to the start of the clash. Sizeable crowd jumbled up at Tokyo to witness the two
athletes who were playing the second match of the day.
Cibulkova faced a severe test at the start of the match but didn’t bow down and dug deep to extract a serve hold. She turned the tables on her rival in the fourth game of the match and worked her way brilliantly to gather a breakpoint
that gave her a lead of 3-1. Both players swapped breakthroughs in the following two games that kept the lead of the Slovak intact.
A serve hold to love at each end of the court pushed the scores to 5-3 in favour of the 12th seed Slovak. She registered the final serve hold in the ninth game and took a set lead. It was crucial for the Spanish to begin
the second phase of the match at a high-note having already put to a trail of a set but she failed to do so and lost the breakpoint in the first game.
Cibulkova kept on pressurizing the rival and yielded yet another breakthrough by the end of the fifth game. She was cruising along at 4-1 when the comeback from the 30-year-old Spaniard was witnessed. Garrigues bagged two back-to-back
breakpoints to level the scores at 4-4. With no drama in the remaining part of the match, a tie-breaker round was enforced which was easily won by the Slovak.
Dominika Cibulkova will contest the second round match against the winner of the clash between Jie Zheng and Vania King.
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