Wozniacki back from the brink
Kerber lives to fight another day
FORMER world No 1 Caroline Wozniacki came within two points of defeat yesterday against unseeded Estonian Anett Kontaveit before recovering to win 3-6, 7-6, 6-2 and reach the fourth round of Wimbledon.
The Dane, seeded five, was getting overpowered as she trailed by a set and 3-5 to the powerful Kontaveit but she hung on grimly and turned the match around.
Kontaveit, one of the most dangerous unseeded players in the women’s draw having won the Den Bosch grasscourt title in the build-up to Wimbledon, served for the match at 5-4 in the second set and was 30-0 ahead in that game.
She missed a routine backhand that would have given her three match points and Wozniacki levelled at 5-5.
World No 38 Kontaveit broke again to lead 6-5 but faltered on serve once more with the winning line so close.
She crumbled in the tiebreak and Wozniacki’s experience paid off in the decider as the Dane moved through to a last-16 clash with hard-hitting American Coco Vandeweghe.
Meanwhile, if Angelique Kerber hopes to become the first German to win the Wimbledon title since Steffi Graf in 1996, she will have to draw up an emergency game plan as she cannot afford to keep flirting with danger as she did against American outsider Shelby Rogers.
Kerber, who was runner-up to Serena Williams last year, has struggled for form in recent months and lived dangerously for more than two hours yesterday before eventually securing a fourth-round place with a 4-6, 7-6, 6-4 victory.
That Kerber eventually landed safely in the fourth round was more down to Rogers’s lack of grasscourt experience than the German suddenly finding her range.
Rogers belted down 48 winners compared with just 25 from Kerber but she was eventually undone by her unforced errors – the final tally totalling 47.
“She was hitting the balls very hard. I was just trying to find my rhythm,” said twice grand slam champion Kerber.
“The key was that I was fighting, and I was never giving up... doesn’t matter what the score was.”
Kerber will face 2016 French Open champion Garbine Muguruza today for a place in the quarter-finals. – Reuters