Samantha Stosur crushes Chinese super star Li Na; advances into quarterfinal – Rogers Cup 2011
Australian Samantha Stosur crushed the Chinese super star Li Na in the third round of the Rogers Cup 2011. Stosur and Na battled it out on the hard courts of the Rexall Centre in York University, Toronto, Canada. This year’s French
Open titlist Li Na lost in straight sets of 6-2, 6-4 against Samantha Stosur in one hour and 29 minutes.
Opening the set was Stosur who during the set struck 2 double faults, but her old fangled rival struck 3 extra double faults and lost her competitive.
Li was struggling to find her rhythm and was unable to completely utilize her forehand, whereas the Australian had strong powerful strokes that won her an exceptional 65% of her total service points.
Stosur kept Na on her toes and made her run around the court like a ping pong ball, World number 11 (Stosur) was a barrage of well placed dropped shots against the Chinese who was barely able to make a return on them. Stosur won
an average 49% in her total set points against Na who barely attained 9 out of 26 points, making it a pathetic 35% win in her total return points.
The Aussie was dominant over the world number 6 (Li) and broke her opponent twice, while, Na was not able to break Stosur’s serve even once during the entire set.
Hence, by accomplishing seven more points and 55% win in total set points Stosur served her opponent the set.
The first set was a lovely play from Stosur as she eliminated Li Na in just 35 minutes of play. The second set didn’t see much of a difference in Li’s performance, instead, again she was unable to break her opponent and had far
too many unforced errors, showing obvious signs that this was her very first match since Wimbledon.
The 27-year-old (Stosur) was a powerhouse of unstoppable shots aimed at her opponent, who was unable to reply back and hence, had an extremely poor return that won her only 21 out of 61 points, making it only 34% of her total return
points.
Stosur won the second set by accomplishing 66% of her total service points and thus, bagged the set with two extra points than Li Na’s.
The two had met earlier this year at the D’Italia held in Rome, Italy where Stosur had won 7-6(6), 6-0 in straight sets and led the head-to-head with a 3-0. This was yet the fourth chance given to Li Na by Higher Power to restore
her dignity and equalize the head-to-head.
Following her loss, Li Na said, "She has a huge, big serve, not like the other girls, it's tough after a break to come back for the first match. I didn't play a tournament for six or seven weeks. So at the beginning I didn't really
know what to do. Hopefully it'll get better and I'll start training hard tomorrow to try to be ready for Cincinnati."
Perhaps the crowd chanting “Na Na Na Na Na” got to the Chinese superstar. A disheartened Li Na now makes her way to the Cincinnati Open next week while Samantha Stosur moves on ahead to play in the quarterfinal round here.
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