Early exit for out-of-sorts defending champion
"I felt a bit discombobulated out there."
Lauren Davis
Lauren Davis’ ASB Classic title defence lasted little more than an hour as the reigning champion was sent packing in the first round.
The fifth seed hardly fired a shot against fellow American, qualifier Sachia Vickery, going down 6-1 6-2 in just 63 minutes at Stanley Street in Auckland yesterday.
Third seed Barbora Strycova was also given a huge scare against former French Open finalist Sara Errani before holding her nerve in a tense three-hour marathon to win 6-4 6-7 (3) 6-4.
Davis’ result continued a poor recent record for the women’s defending champion in Auckland with Zheng Jie and Venus Williams losing at the same stage in 2013 and 2016 respectively, while Sloane Stephens withdrew before the tournament began last year.
Davis was a surprise winner last year and after an inconsistent second half of 2017, few expected her to be back in the final this week.
But it was a disappointing display from the 24-year-old which will see her drop into the 70s in the world rankings, particularly given that she had won all three of her previous matches against Vickery.
‘‘I definitely didn’t feel my best,’’ Davis said. ‘‘I felt a bit discombobulated out there, a bit disconnected. I was going for my shots way too early and just not patient enough. But I’ll take what i can away from the match and move forward.’’
Defending a title for the first time in her career, Davis insisted she was focused on the present and that did not play on her mind ahead of the tournament.
But the start of the match told a different story. Davis found herself in a big hole at 4-0 down after being broken in her first two service games.
Davis finally showed some signs of life in a long fifth game, forcing four break points before Vickery made one of her few mistakes of the opening set.
But she could not get going on serve as Vickery broke right back before serving out the set in 32 minutes. Davis at least managed to hold serve in the opening game of the second set but that is where the good news ended.
Vickery quickly resumed her dominance, racing to a 5-1 lead before setting up a second-round clash against Paraguay’s Veronica Cepede Royg, who beat Lara Arruabarrena 6-3 6-3.
While there was an American getting the attention for beating a compatriot on Centre Court, out on court two another American who beat both those players at last year’s US Open was picking up a win. Sofia Kenin, who turned 19 in November, defeated Jana Fett from Croatia 6-4 6-4, putting in an impressive performance that warranted the wildcard given to her to play in the Classic.
‘‘I’m really pleased with that match, I played well and I was fighting through every point,’’ Kenin said in an accent that’s a mix of American and Russian, which is where she was born.
‘‘She had three really good wins and coming in first match, I was a bit nervous because of that.
‘‘But I knew if I played my best game I was going to do well.’’
It’s always a risk for a tournament to give a wildcard to a young player, few people would have heard of.
Although Kenin got to No 2 in the world as a junior and defeated firstly Davis, then Vickery at the US Open, before losing to Maria Sharapova 7-5 6-2, only tennis buffs would know anything about her.
Meanwhile, Strycova was pushed to the brink by Errani, the Italian wildcard who returned from a two-month doping ban in October.
With nine singles title to her name, Errani always loomed as a potential banana skin for the 23rdranked Strycova and the 30-yearold showed all of her experience to level the match in the second set tiebreak.
The third set was a grinding affair as the players alternated breaks on serve on multiple occasions. But Strycova came home strong to set up a clash with Sweden’s Johanna Larsson in the next round.
Seventh-seeded German Mona Barthel could not avoid defeat, though, going down 6-2 6-2 to American Varvara Lepchenko.