US Open 2012 Day Three: Women’s roundup – Tennis News
Day Three of the US Open Championships witnessed some more cracking matchups between the top class performers to treat the local crowd at the glorious Flushing Meadows. Only the Top Half of the draw was competed from the women’s side, featuring some upsetting results as well.
Leading the victors, top ranked Victoria Azarenka faced no troubles in sidelining the Belgian underdog, Kirsten Flipkens, in the second round draw. She outsmarted the qualifier in twin sets, 6-2, 6-2, to book a date with the 28th seeded Chinese contender, Jie Zheng, in the next round. The Chinese wrapped up a 6-3, 6-1, win over the Slovak qualifier, Magdalena Rybarikova, in the second round.
Number three seed Russian beauty queen, Maria Sharapova, carried on with her belligerence to annihilate Lourdes Dominguez Lino of Spain, sparing barely one game for her in the entire match to finish at 6-0, 6-1. She will be up against the local wildcard entrant, Mallory Burdette, who surprised the unseeded Czech, Lucie Hradecka, 6-2, 6-4, earlier that day.
Current winner of the Emirates Airlines US Open Series, Petra Kvitova also progressed to the third round after dumping Alize Cornet of France, 6-4, 6-3, on Wednesday afternoon. The fifth seeded Czech will be facing the other French candidate, Pauline Parmentier, who dispatched the Belgian tennis ace, Yanina Wickmayer, in the second round.
The seventh seeded defending champion, Samantha Stosur from Australia, looked very strong in her 6-3, 6-0, victory against the Romanian underdog, Edina Gallovits-Hall on Day Three of the mega event. Local contender, Varvara Lepchenko, defeated Anastasia Rodionova, 6-2, 6-2, in the second round and will be squaring off against Stosur in the next encounter.
The biggest surprise came when the three-time former US Open champion, Kim Clijsters, lost to the 18-year-old British tennis prodigy, Laura Robson, in the most thrilling match of the day. It was Clijsters’ last match before her retirement, losing it 6-7(4), 6-7(5), in a dismal fashion. Robson will face the number nine seed, Li Na of China, in the third round.
11th seeded French powerhouse, Marion Bartoli also cracked a winning show on Wednesday after hunting down Romina Oprandi, 6-2, 1-6, 7-5, in a stiff battle. She is now up against Kristina Mladenovic, the French wildcard entrant who stunned the number 17th seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, 6-1, 6-2, in the second round.
Other winners on the third day of the Grand Slam event included the 19th seed Russian, Nadia Petrova, Czech Republic’s Lucie Safarova, Hungarian beauty, Mandy Minella and Anna Tatishvili from Georgia.
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