Day of big upsets in Dubai
AUSTRALIAN OPEN WINNER KENIN FALLS ALONG WITH SVITOLINA AND BENCIC
Chief Reporter
Australian Open winner Sofia Kenin and two former champions were among the major casualties on the second day of the Dubai Duty Free Women’s Open.
Kenin, the latest Grand Slam champion after her three-set win against Garbine Muguruza in Melbourne earlier this month, surrendered to 20-year-old fast-rising Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan in the biggest upset of the day.
Earlier, defending champion Belinda Bencic and former two-time winner Elina Svitolina both failed to survive the opening round rigours.
Improving youngsters
Bencic, who occupies a career-high No. 4 this week, went down in three sets 1-6, 6-1, 6-1 to Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, while Svitolina caved in for a 6-2, 6-1 defeat at the hands of American qualifier, Jennifer Brady. Rybakina has been one of the fastest improving youngsters on the WTA.
A year ago, the Kazakh girl was ranked No. 192.
Last week, she fell to Belgian Kiki Bertens in the St Petersburg final but rose to a careerhigh No. 19. The 20-year-old has had a solid start to the season while winning the Hobart International and ending runner-up at the Shenzhen Open in January.
“I am happy that all my hard work is paying off,” Rybakina said.
“To be honest, I wasn’t nervous at all because I knew it was going to be tough. Actually I told myself it’s good practice and I didn’t expect that I would win. I mean, I tried to do my best, but I was not nervous,” she added.
Kenin had the advantage with an early break, but Rybakina broke back in the tenth to push the set into a tie-break, which Kenin went on to dominate and win 7-2.
Crucial breakthrough
In the second, the 20-yearold underdog opened her shots and this saw Rybakina getting two successive breaks in the seventh and ninth games to draw level with a 6-3 score.
In the deciding third, Rybakina got the crucial breakthrough in the eighth after which she served out set and match in a little over two hours on centre court.
Earlier in the afternoon session, Bencic had seemed to be on the way to an easy victory as she dominated the first set, beginning the match by winning an astonishing 19 consecutive points.
But Pavlyuchenkova dug in deep to turn the match around, using her greater strength to unsettle her opponent.
After dropping her serve to begin the second set, Pavlyuchenkova swept the next six games to level the match and then took the first three games of the third set to put herself firmly in control.