Marion Bartoli retires against Anabel Medina Garrigues in qualies – Tournament of Championships 2011
French, Marion Bartoli, had a major slipup in the second set and incurred an ankle injury at the start of the third set which forced her to retire in the quarter-final of Tournament of Championships 2011. Anabel Medina Garrigues of Spain marches into the semi-finals with the final score of 4-6, 7-6, 1-0 (retired).
The match was played on Friday 4th of November on indoor hard court in Bali, Indonesia. The see-saw battle continued for two hours and forty minutes before Bartoli injured herself and had to retire.
A Wonderful crowd had gathered in the beautiful arena to support their favourite players. World No.9, Bartoli, was the hot favourite to win the match provided her previous head-to-head lead of 6-2 and superior ranks.
It was a conventional start to the match with both players holding on to their serves in the initial games and carried the score to 2-2 without any drama. The Frenchwoman built momentum and had smashed two aces in her first two games.
The expected break in the third game came when Garrigues over hit her forehand shot. She was really disappointed at a much lethargic attempt in the fifth game. The French capitalized on her serve and accomplished the opening set in a commanding fashion.
Second set was kicked-off slowly and both players held their serves and pushed the score to 1-2 before Bartoli broke again and led her way with a lead of 3-1. The same scenario happened in the first set when the Spanish couldn’t break to make an impact but this time she was prolific in her approach and made a terrific comeback from the 5-3 score line.
The Espanola broke in the ninth game and saved two match points and coupled it with a marvellous ace in the tenth game to square the score at 5-5. Crowd was ecstatic at her remarkable comeback and applauded her with for a prolonged time.
Both players held their serves in the next game to move the score to 6-6. Tie-breaker was enforced to decide the set between the two. French had her chances in the set to clinch the semi-final berth but she couldn’t capitalize on any of her opportunities. It was extremely tamed effort by the World No.9 who showed nerves in the closing moments of the second set.
After an incredibly close tie-breaker, Bartoli committed another double-fault to complete the enthusiastic comeback from the Spanish. Third set could only see one game completed before Bartoli hurt her ankle and couldn’t continue her title campaign and reluctantly retired from the event with tears.
Anabel Medina Garrigues luckily marches into the semi-final of the tournament; she will go head-to-head against the winner of the match between Daniela Hantuchova and Sabine Lisicki.
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