Maria Sharapova slays Gisela Dulko to jump into the third round – BNP Paribas Open 2012
World number two, Maria Sharapova, trashed the Argentine doubles specialist, Gisela Dulko, in the second round of the BNP Paribas Open. The slender-legged beauty queen just took 66 minutes to overpower the rival in straight sets
6-2, 6-0.
It was obvious that the Argentine will face a crushing defeat considering the fact that the Russian is in sublime run of form. It was the fourth triumph for the 24-years-old Russian against the Argentine who has just won one face-off
during the second round of the Wimbledon 2009.
The finalist of the year’s first Grand Slam tournament, the Australian Open, started the match with a successful serve hold before powering down her opponent in the following game to win the first breakpoint.
The stage was set for Sharapova to dominate the rest of the proceedings and she didn’t waste any opportunity to nail down her rival. She allowed just a single serve hold to the Argentine before breaking her serve in the sixth game
for the second time in the set. She was leading the scores 5-1 at that stage.
A gift from the Russian in the form of a breakthrough for the Argentine was the last game Dulko won in the match. She was broken back in the following game to round off the first set proceedings. Trailing one set down, Dulko was
no match for the Russian and that was made crystal clear in the second set.
A flurry of breakpoints for Sharapova in the second half of the match took her to the third round of the tournament. She won 29 points and donated 15 to her opponent. Dulko saved one breakpoint but failed to repeat the similar
performance on three other occurrences.
Sharapova won 59 points in total and allowed the Argentine to bag 32. It was a one-sided show and was completely dominated from the former world number one, who is the most famous superstar in the world of women tennis.
Simona Halep will be praying that the Russian don’t hit her sublime form in the third round clash otherwise she will be the next victim on Monday. The chances of an upset are minimal. Sharapova is almost uncontested since her comeback
from an injury lay-off. Only the reigning number one, Victoria Azarenka, has been able to bully the Russian. It will be interesting to see how long the 6’2 tall Russian can go in Indian Wells this year.
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