Australian Open - Day Five

Day five of the Australian Open and Serena Williams beat Daniela Hantuchova  in straight sets. To be honest it was quite a boring match and Serena did not need to get out of second gear to win. 

I think if Serena had been super motivated the scoreline would have been a little more embarrassing for Daniela. 

Ni La beat Lucie Safarova in three sets and after losing the first set badly Ni La regrouped and was able to win the remaining sets. 

However if Ni La struggled to beat Lucie then winning the Australian Open has just become an even bigger challenge.

Eugene Bouchard beat Lauren Davis in straight sets to make it to the fourth round. 

Eugene is doing really well at the moment only time will tell how well she is doing when she meets tougher opponents.  

In the men's draw Novak Djokovic beat Denis Istomin in straight sets. So far in this tournament Novak has not really been stretched and that can sometimes work against a player in the later stages of the slam. 

David Ferrer also recorded a straight sets win against Jeremy Chardy to make to the third round. 

He is making is way through the draw largely unnoticed and has a great chance to win his first grand slam. 

Australian Open - Day Three

Day three at the Australian Open and Serena Williams beat Vesna Dolonc in straight sets. Serena played well and will now play Daniela Hantuchova in the next round. 

Jie Zheng beat the talented American Madison Keys in three sets. For Madison this will be a learning curve and as she was leading by four games to one the third set. 

These are kind of losses that Madison will learn from and will hopefully come back stronger. 

Sam Stosur hammered Tsvetana Pironkova in straight sets which included a six love second set. It was a suprise result considering that Tsvetana won the Sydney tournament over the weekend. 

Another surprise result was Monica Niculescu beating Sabine Liscki in three sets. I still feel that Sabine saves all her best tennis for Wimbledon and is not that motivated for the other slams. 

In the men's draw Novak Djokovic and David Ferrer both recorded straight sets wins to progress to the third round. 

Australian Open - Day One - Women's Draw

The Australian Open started today and it is the first grand slam of the tennis season.

Daniela Hantuchova beat Heather Watson in three close sets. Heather played well in most parts but her unforced error counts where the most telling. 

Daniela was able to use her fourteen years of tennis experience to win this match. Using tactics like the moon balls which I have not seen for a while. 

Heather will drop even lower in the rankings but she can use this performance in a positive way and the good results will soon come. 

Kirsten Flipkens beat Laura Robson in straight sets. It was a poor match from Laura's perspective and she simply did not look match fit. 

I always thought it was going to be a tough match for Laura but this was not helped by her lack of match fitness. 

Ekaterina Makarova beat Venus Williams in three close sets and in what was a very high quality match.

Serena Williams beat seventeen year old Ashley Barty in straight sets. However played well and she is definitely one to watch for the future. 

The shock of the day was Petra Kivitova losing to Luksika Kumkhum in three close sets. 

Luksika has never played a top ten player but she was able to match Petra's power and win the match. 

US Open - day ten

Day ten at the US Open and the men's draw still has it's top three seeds and the women's draw still has it's top two seeds.

Rafael Nadal beat Tommy Robredo in straight sets. This was a clinical match from Rafael who did not allow Tommy to get into the match at all. Rafa will now face Richard Gasquet in the semi-finals.

Richard Gasquet beat the fourth seed David Ferrer in five sets. Richard won the first two sets then had to come back to win in the fifth set for his place in the semi finals.

In the women's draw the unseeded Flavia Pennetta  beat the tenth seed and her compatriot Roberta Vinci in straight sets. To reach the semi-finals where she will face Victoria Azarenka. 

Victoria Azarenka beat Daniela Hantuchova in straight sets to make it to the semi-finals against the unseeded Flavia Pennetta.

Meanwhile in the women's doubles Venus and Serena Williams beat Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Lucie Safarova in straight sets to reach the doubles quarter finals.

 However in the second set Venus Williams ran out of energy and both Venus and Serena did well to close it out in straight sets. As I suspect that if the match had gone to a third set it would have been a real challenge for Venus to finish. 

They now face the number one seeds Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci this match is going to be a real challenge for Venus especially and hopefully they will win it and make it to the semi-finals.

US Open- day nine

Day nine at the US open was all about the bagels... 

Novak Djokovic beat Marcel Granollers in straight sets and he bagled Marcel in the second and the third set. Novak completed this match in under two hours and he will now face Mikhail Youzhny in the quarter finals for a place in the semi final. 

Serena bagled Carla Suarez Narravo in both the first and second set. Serena was obviously still pumped up from her previous match and was not taking any prisoners.

Sadly for Carla this humiliation was probably made worst by the fact that was her 25th birthday and Serena knew!

Some in the crowd where demanding Serena give Carla a game. But in a ground slam match you cannot afford to be so charitable things can change very quickly. 

It's good that Serena was able to maintain her focus. As I have watched one or two of Serena's matches where she starts off very focused then loses it. So I was pleased that she was able to maintain her focus.

Andy Murray beat Denis Istomin in four sets. It was a good win for Andy ad he started a little slow and maybe he was not expecting the match between Serena and Carla to finish so quickly.

However he refocused and won the remaining sets quite comfortably. He will now play Stanislas Wawrinka in the quarter finals for a place in the semi finals. 

Li Na beat Ekaterina Makarova in three sets and Li Na has been in good form. She played well at Wimbledon and has played well here. 

She now faces Serena Williams and they have met nine times and Li Na has beaten Serena once this was about three years ago.

Victoria Azarenka beat Ana Ivanovic in three sets. This was a hard fought win for Victoria but bearing in mind she has had to play on consecutive days this was a good win for Victoria. 

Victoria will now play Daniela Hantuchova in the quarter finals for a place in the semi finals.

US Open - day eight

Day eight at the US open was very much affected by rain.

Tommy Rebredo beat Roger Federer in straight sets. This was a surprising result and for Roger to lose so early in a slam is unusual.

However at 32 years old it will not get any easier for Roger. Roger is going to have to adapt his game and become super motivated to another grand slam.

Rafael Nadal beat Philip Kohlschreiber in four sets and It is the first time. That he has been really tested at the tournament and so it was good that he was able to come through it.

Daniela Hantuchova beat the American wildcard Alison Riske in three sets and it is the first time in about ten years that Daniela has made it to the quarter finals. 

Flavia Pennetta beat Simona Halep in three sets. This was a very good win for Flavia against the in-form Simona who has already won four titles in this year. 

US Open- day two

Day two of the US Open was pretty eventful. Heather Watson lost in three sets to Simona Halep and in the second set Heather could have won the match instead she made too many unforced errors and costly double faults. Which ultimately cost Heather the match.

The 11th seed and former US champion Sam Stosur lost in three sets to Victoria Duval and Victoria is a seventeen year old  Haitian American ranked 296 in the world. So it was a real shock that she was able to beat a former US Open champion. 

She now faces Daniela Hantuchova in the third round it will be interesting to see if can continue and make it to the fourth round.

Mini round up of the various tennis tournaments taking place this week

I am disappointed that both Laura Robson and Heather Watson lost there second matches. Laura was playing in the Mercury Insurance Open and lost in straight sets to Petra Kivtova. Heather was playing in the Citi Open and lost in straight sets to Alize Cornet.

Heather is currently number 76 in the world so this will not help her ranking and on top of that she has just split from her long term coach and is now working with Jeremy Bates until the end of the hard court season. I am not sure this a good strategy and it could set her back least a year and the chances of winning any kind of silverware become slimmer and slimmer with every passing day.

Agnieska Radwanska is playing her second match at the Citi Open tournament against Daniela Hantuchova. After Agnieska shock loss to Dominika Cibulková  in the Stanford final she will want to bounce back with this title. So it will be interesting to see if she is able to succeed but I think that with the defensive type of tennis that she plays  it will always be challenge to win tennis tournaments.

I am looking forward to the Canadian Open as Serena Williams is scheduled to play there and unfortunately Maria Sharapova has pulled out  of this tournament with an injury but I am confident that it will still be a competitive tournament.

Wimbledon Day Two

Day two of Wimbledon was full of shocks and surprises and this is my review of men's and women's games.

Men

Novak Djokovic had a comfortable straight sets victory and I  Iike Novak’s style of tennis and he also come across as an engaging character. For this tournament now that Rafa is out I would love Andy, Novak or Jon Wilfred to win.

Women

I  am disappointed that Heather Watson went out in the first round and watching her match I could see that she was struggling with her fitness. I noticed that she is also going to play doubles which I think is probably not a great idea as she still needs to recover from that bout of glandular fever.

Laura Robson did very well and I did not expect her to get past Maria Kirilenko but she served and returned the ball really well and hardly made any errors. I was very surprised at Maria Kirilenko as she is normally a good grass court player but she seemed a little one dimensional today and when she was losing it did not seem to me that she had a plan B.

After the disappointment of Heather Watson, Tara Moore definitely lifted my gloom and even though she lost in to Kaia Kanepi she is definitely one for the future. I was very impressed with Tara’s serve and movement so I did a little google research and found out she trained at Nick Bollettieri’s academy which explains a lot. As there are not too many UK female tennis players that can move and serve like that. I am hoping that Tara will get right sort of sponsors and a coach that will help take her career to the next level.

I am little surprised that Daniela Hantuchova is out already after winning the title in Birmingham I thought she was going to do well here but sadly this did not happen and was beaten in straight sets. Serena Williams played well enough to win the match and I think she was familiarising herself with the grass and so I hope she will be able to play even better in second round.