Lucie Safarova, Alla Kudryavtseva through to the second round at 2011 BNP Paribas Open
World number 32 Lucie Safarova survived a three set thriller against Kristina Barrois on Wednesday to book her place in the second round of 2011 BNP Paribas Open.
The contest turned out to be breath taking as both players refused to give up on their serve games. The first set went into a tie breaker after some high quality tennis was displayed by the contestants. But the Russian held her
nerves and converted a long rally in her favour to take the first 7-6 (9).
Barrois showed great determination and mental strength to overcome her opponent in an equally competitive and exciting second set. The German clinched the set 7-6 (5) with a clean strike down the line to level the set score 1-1.
The Third set however proved to be very one sided as the Czech broke her opponent on three occasions to complete a deserving win in a match that lasted for 2 hours and 40 minutes.
The 24-year-old Safarova was dominant and precise in the serve department of the game as she fired 18 aces in the match. She also converted 77 percent of the first serve points which allowed her to attack the challenger freely
while retuning the serve. In addition to a strong attacking ability the Czech had an exceptional defence strategy as well saving 10 out of 11 break points in the match. In the final set she converted all three break points she received to win the match with
ease after two nail biting sets.
The Czech had a very good start to the season as she reached the quarterfinals at the 2011 Brisbane international. She then reached the third round of 2011 Australian Open improving her Women’s Tennis Association ranking significantly.
Although she fell in the first rounds of 2011 Paris Indoors and 2011 Dubai Duty Free, world number 32, Safarova will be hoping to put up another impressive show at the ATP Masters 1000 event to go up the WTA rankings even further. She will now take on another
German, Andrea Petkovic, who received a bye into the next round.
In another match Alla Kudryavtseva of Russia clinched a three setter 3-6, 6-3 and 6-3 to set up a meeting with world number 2 Kim Clijsters of Belgium.
Kudryavtseva started off in an uncertain fashion as she lost the first set 6-3 but she came back strongly to win the next two sets with ease. Kudryavtseva overwhelmed her opponent with her powerful serves as she fired 9 aces in
the match.
However, the Russian committed 9 double faults and a number of unforced errors, an aspect of the game where she needs considerable hard work if she wants to achieve similar results against a quality player like Clijsters.
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