Wozniacki shatters Dementieva, Zvonareva beats Jankovic to progress at Doha
World Number 1 Caroline Wozniacki, the new darling of tennis, took further steps on Tuesday towards the year-end World Number 1 position after she defeated Russian tennis pro Elena Dementieva in straight sets at her first match of the WTA Championship events
at Doha, in the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex. On the same day, Vera Zvonareva overcame her Serbian opponent Jelena Jankovic in 83 minutes, winning their match in straight sets as well.
20 year old Wozniacki managed to defeat her first opponent in the opening Maroon Group match, and with one more win, she will finish her already exceptional year in remarkable style, giving her a substantial lead where rankings are concerned over the rest
of the WTA players. She is currently at 7270 points on the rankings of the WTA, giving her a great advantage of 1174 points on second seed Zvonateva. Clijsters is third on the list, with 5295 points.
The Dane, who has won six titles this year, kicked off the match with a 4-1 lead within the very first set owing to a break in the third game. From the beginning of the match, Wozniacki adapted an aggressive style of play, dominating the entire court. Dementieva
was forced to do all the running in the match from one end of the court to the other, while Wozniacki played a calm game which gave her plenty of chances to pick and choose her lobs and shots, giving herself complete authority during the game.
Wozniacki seized her second break of the match in the sixth game, finding a notch to pull herself up to 5-1 and closing the set with a comfortably held serve. Dementieva, who at this point was winded and out of breath, fumbled an easy shot to hit a weak
return into the net. Although both players were forced to use ice packs in between points – the temperature hit 32 degrees with 60% humidity levels – it was clear that Wozniacki was the better equipped player, both physically and mentally, and that she was
conditioned for the challenge.
The Dane scored a victory over her opponent by refusing to ease up her game, and scoring breaks in the third, fifth and seventh games of the match to finish Dementieva in 53 minutes. She seemed elated by her performance, telling reporters, “It was a very
nice start, definitely. I’m very happy to be through this first match. It’s always tough to start a new tournament. Against Elena, I knew we have had so many tough matches in the past. It’s nice to get this one.”
Wozniacki is also aware of her status as the tournament’s favourite, saying, “Of course you feel when you’re the fan favourite, when the people are for you, and that always helps me a little bit and gives me that extra push in the right direction.”
Earlier in the day, the opening White Group match with Zvonareva against Jankovic resulted in a 6-3, 6-0 victory for the Russian World Number 2 Zvonareva. She played a balanced game, ending rallies with fine shots; Jankovic’s unreliable performance also
helped her to win the match, with the Serbian player making over 30 unforced errors. With this win, Zvonareva scored a 7-6 advantage in their meetings together, and managed her first defeat of Jankovic in a 6-love set. She was quite pleased with her performance,
saying, “Yeah, I played a very good match overall. I had some few unforced errors in that first set. But I think overall I played really well. Even though if I had few unforced errors, I was coming up with great shots right afterwards.”
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