GREAT ESCAPES
24 Of the 31 points Wozniacki won when she first faced match point
I don’t know how I got back into the match. I was like, ‘This is my last chance’ Wozniacki 3 hours and 37 minutes it took tsonga to beat shapovalov in five sets
Rafael Nadal had to wait while Caroline Wozniacki saved two match points and worked her way back into the Australian Open in the preceding match on Rod Laver Arena.
Nadal, the 2017 runner-up, wasted no time in reaching the third round, dropping only one service game — while serving for the match — and making just 10 unforced errors in a 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 (4) win over Leonardo Mayer on Wednesday.
“It’s an important victory for me, I mean, he’s a tough opponent. Leonardo is a player with big potential,” said Nadal, who won the French and US Opens last year but had his preparation for Australia delayed because of an injured right knee. “After a while without being on the competition ... second victory in a row, that’s very important.”
There was more drama earlier on the center court and Margaret Court Arena, when second-seeded Wozniacki and 2008 runner-up JoWilfried Tsonga had to come back from big deficits.
Wozniacki was 5-1 down and facing two match points in the third set against No. 119-ranked Jana Fett before deciding she had no choice but to attack.
“That was crazy,” Wozniacki said after winning the last six games in a memorable 3-6, 6-2, 7-5 victory.
“I don’t know how I got back into the match. I was like, ‘This is my last chance’. At 5-1, 40-15, I felt like I was one foot out of the tournament. She served a great serve down the T — it was just slightly out. I was kind of lucky.”
Wozniacki won the next nine points, and 24 of the 31 points played from when she first faced match point. She clinched a 75-minute third set on her first match point when Fett netted a backhand.
The former No. 1-ranked Wozniacki will next play No. 30 Kiki Bertens, who beat Nicole Gibbs 7-6 (3), 6-0.
Tsonga rallied from 2-5 in the fifth to overcome Denis Shapovalov 3-6, 6-3, 1-6, 7-6 (4), 7-5 in a 3-hour, 37-minute match that contained one of his nonchalant between-the-legs shots on an important point.
In what shapes as an entertaining showdown, he’ll meet No. 17-seeded Nick Kyrgios in the next round.
Kyrgios had a 7-5, 6-4, 7-6 (2) win over Viktor Troicki, overcoming audio problems at Hisense Arena and complaining to chair umpire James Keothavong, who ended up turning off his microphone.
Keothavong’s night got slightly worse when Troicki hit an errant backhand return that slammed directly into the chair umpire’s head during the tiebreaker. The Serbian player walked, smiling, to the umpire’s chair to apologise, while Keothavong joked: “It’s not my day, is it?” —