Francesca Schiavone muscles past Jelena Dokic in the opening round – Wimbledon Championships 2011
As dark clouds swarmed over All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club on Monday, play continued on the courts as world number 45, Jelena Dokic of Australia put up a great fight against the world number seven, Francesca Schiavone
of Italy in the opening round of Wimbledon Championships. However, the Italian was able to clinch a 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 victory for herself.
Dokic, who is ranked 45th in the world, claimed the second set, as well as the sympathy of the British crowd as she continued to hit a series of powerful serve and agile returns, but was unfortunately defeated after
losing her grip on the Italian in the third set.
Schiavone, who could not defeat the Aussie in her last three attempts, looked in total control and continued to play the match with a great deal of patience. She displayed some of her trademark tennis and quickly raced to a 6-4
lead in the opener. Her anticipation and movement was supreme and her ability to counterpunch and make the transition from defence to attack shone through. For an athlete who could not move past the Aussie before, she was actually producing some brilliant
tennis.
Despite a humiliating defeat in the opener, a strange turn of fate brought Dokic to a 5-0 lead in the second set. Dokic, to her credit, displayed some nice touches, and flashes of gutsy shot making that carried her to the finals
at the UNICEF Open, a week ago. The 28-year-old Aussie spent a large proportion of the second set playing cat and mouse with the Italian, and luckily managed to find her service rhythm that took her to a breadstick win in the second set.
Too good to be true, the number sixth seed stepped up the level of her game and broke early on to establish a lead in the decider. Dokic pounced, forcing Schiavone to play some awkward balls, and the 30-year-old did extremely well
to save four break points. Buoyed by her valiant efforts, Schiavone took the benefit of an extremely slack Dokic and managed to nab the third set with a 6-3 score.
Schiavone clinched her opening round victory with the help of five aces and a whopping twenty winners. Not to mention, she scored 70 percent of points behind her first serve and 43 percent behind her second serves. Moreover, she
converted three of six break points and won 14 of 29 net approaches against Dokic to win the match in three sets.
Awaiting Schiavone in round two would be either Czech’s Barbora Zahlavova-Strycova or Canada’s Aleksandra Wozniak.
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