Lyudmyla Kichenok sweeps away Michaela Hončová in 1st round – Slovak Open 2011
Ukrainian qualifier Lyudmyla Kichenok ousted Slovakian qualifier Michaela Hončová in the first round of the Slovak Open 2011.
At the Národné Tenisové Centrum in Bratislava, Slovakia, the two contestants took up the competition on indoor hard courts and after just fifty one minutes the Ukrainian qualifier sent the Slovak qualifier to the lockers by defeating her in straight sets of 6-0, 6-2 on Wednesday the 16th of November 2011.
Even though both the sets were dominated by Kichenok, she had a flawless victory in the opening set. She had a good first serve winning a grandiose eighty one percent of her first points. Moreover, she stood her ground when it came to her return game and was capable of bagging a walloping 64 percent of her total return points in the opening set.
In addition, her defence did not falter and she expertly saved both her breakpoints and instead skilfully bagged a sixty percent of her breakpoints won. On the contrary her opponent was unable to take the lead and lost control over game due to which she lost the opening set.
Kicking off the opening set was Honcova and she was unable to hold either of her service games in the entire set. On the contrary, Kichenok not only expertly handled all her serves but also bagged all her opponent’s service games which resulted in a bagel set victory of the opening round.
Commencing the second set was once again Honcova and this time she was able to hold her respective serve to initiate the open the scoreboard at 1-0. Following behind was Kichenok and she too held her service game to place herself on the scoreboard at 1-1. It was in the third game that Honcova double faulted on her serve and gifted away a crucial game to her adversary.
Mean while, Kichenok skilfully capitalized on the breakpoint and then held her serve to take the lead at the end of the fourth game. She then took out her A-game and repeated the feat. She was now only a game away from victory and as she held her serve for the last time in the match, she smashed a marvellous backhand winner to seal her victory of the set by restricting her opponent to only two games.
The Ukrainian qualifier not only bagged the match in straight sets but also managed to reserve a spot in the second round of the event where she will be facing Slovakian wildcard entrant Anna Schmiedlová.
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