Kristina Kucova blows away Tetyana Arefyeva in the first round – Baku Cup 2011
Slovakian, Kristina Kucova, blew away the Ukrainian, Tetyana Arefyeva in the first round of the Baku Cup 2011 at the Baku Tennis Academy, Baku, Azerbaijan. The Slovakian had a comprehensive victory in pronto seventy seven minutes and seventeen seconds 6-3, 6-3.
Prior to this event both the players had contested against each other once this season. In their second meeting both the players were familiar with each other’s strength and weaknesses. The last time they dueled with each other was at the Rolls Royce Women’s Cup, Kristinehamn, Sweden where Tetyana Arefyeva battled it out on a clay court in the third round and triumphed 7-5,7-6(5) winning the tiebreaker and both the sets played. The Higher Power had granted Kristina Kucova another chance to even out the score with her old time competitor (Tetyana) at the first round of the Baku Cup on Tuesday.
Tetyana won the toss and serving first; smashed an ace, had commendable first serve points and was able to avail the only break point chance that she received. However, her accuracy seemed to falter and she struck two double faults, both hit the net. She knew that this was her chance to lead their head to head, however it was a dream short lived. Tetyana was unable to win the match because although she had performed satisfactorily her return game was not as strong and kept running around in circles on the court. At the same time her opponent (Kristina) was eager to avenge her loss and although she didn’t strike an ace and had one double fault she played her serve with great agility and style along with her, stance which was like a wall and kept bouncing everything that came her way, thus enabling her return game to be as good as her serves. In addition she also won the three out of four of her break points and hence finally managed to avenge her loss, winning the set 6-3.
By the end of the first set the score card read 1:0 this was the final deciding set of the match as to whether the Slovakian will win with her lead in the set or will the Ukrainian come back to take her revenge; The match proved to be a comprehensive victory for Kristina, and although Tetyana managed to keep a mediocre consistency on her serve she had a disappointing return game, her precision faltered and she struck one double fault along with two break point advantages that she gave to her opponent. Whereas, the Slovakian managed to not only just hang in the match she performed exceptionally on her serve and gave only one break point opportunity to her opponent along with winning both the break point chances, she won fifty five percent of her total set points and won the match in a run of the mill victory.
Summing it up; the 21-year-old Kristina, won the match due to her consistent performance in her serve and return game. She availed the opportunity and beat her opponent in this match but also equalized her head-to-head score with the Ukrainian to 1-1.
Kristina Kucova managed to qualify to the second round of the Baku Cup where she will be facing the Russian Vera Zvonareva.
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