Greta Arn defeats Abigail Spears in the qualifying second round – Mercury Insurance Open 2011
Kicking off on the 31st of July 2011 was the qualifying second round of Mercury Insurance Open 2011. The Hungarian Greta Arn and the American Abigail Spears were duelling for the second time in their professional career
at the La Costa Resort and Spa, Carlsbad, California. The Hungarian won the match 6-3, 6-4.
The last time they had drawn racquets against each other was on the clay courts during the qualifying second round of the Warsaw Open in 2010. Arn had won the match in a straight set victory 7-5 6-2. Fate had crossed their paths
again but this time it was at the Mercury Open 2011 where the Hungarian won the match again, depriving Spears of her revenge and leading in their head to head 2-0.
During the first set neither of the players had struck a double fault while Arn won the pitch and smashed an ace. An average defence enabled her to save both the break points on her serve and win 50% of break points faced.
While Spears did not ace, she had a good serve and was able to win seventy three percent of her first serve points. Unable to return shots on her opponent’s second serve, she lost the set with almost half as fewer points than Arn’s.
The second set didn’t see much of a change; both the players had performed similarly except that Spears was able to win an extra game and hence, lost 4-6.
Despite her age, the 32 year-old (Arn) won due to consistency in her attack and defence. She was able to break her opponent 4 times and saved 71% of her break points in the match. She won with 14 more points than her opponent’s
in the total match.
Born on the 13th of April 1979, Greta Arn has contested in 680 matches out of which she has won 399 and lost only 281. Her career high ranking was achieved on the 16th of May 2011 when she reached world number
40, while this year she has won 16 matches out of the 26 played.
Her most notable performance was this year was when she won second WTA title at Auckland, where she first defeated number 8 seed Sofia Arvidsson, top seed Maria Sharapova and number 4 seed Julia Goerges in the semi-final and eventually
the number 2 seed Yanina Wickmayer for the title. The current world number 71 (Greta Arn) has bagged 2 WTA titles and four ITF titles in singles and in doubles throughout her professional career.
Tags: