Maria Sharapova trashes Kaia Kanepi to reach the last-four – French Open 2012
World number two, Maria Sharapova, wasted little time in ousting the 23rd seed Estonian, Kaia Kanepi, in the quarter-final clash of the Roland Garros French Open on Wednesday. She squashed the upset queen in straight
sets, 6-2, 6-3 and became the third player to reach the semi-final stage of the tournament.
Both players swapped breakpoints in the opening serve games but Sharapova again broke serve to reclaim the lead and this time registered a resounding serve hold to love to push the scores to 3-1 in her favour. Kanepi smashed four
winners in the following game to post a serve hold to love as well but she failed to win the break back.
Sharapova piled pressure on her rival and won the second breakthrough of the match in the seventh game, when she squandered one opportunity but clubbed the second breakpoint. She was tested to limits in the following serve game
but managed to save a couple of breakpoints and post another serve hold that rounded off the opening set proceedings in her favour.
Kanepi looked strong in the following set and broke the Russian’s serve in the second game to take a lead of 2-0. However, the 25-year-old bounced back with a breakthrough in the next game and held her serve to level the scores
at 2-2.
The Estonian starlet was broken again in the following game and a cracking serve hold to love swirled the set in favour of the Russian. She broke serve for the third time in the set to take the resounding lead of 5-2 and was serving
for the match in the following game but failed to stop her opponent from winning one break back.
However, the cameo from the 26-year-old Estonian ended in the ninth game of the second set when she was broken 30:40 by the Russian who lifted her hands in the air to show her love for the fans and enjoy the glorious moment. She
will go head-to-head in the semi-final clash against the winner of the match between the Kazakh qualifier, Yaroslava Shvedova, and the Czech fourth seed, Petra Kvitova.
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