Bad Gastein Day 2 review

Viktorija Golubic def. (5) Kiki Bertens 6-2 6-2

Heading towards this match, the latest results of the two couldn't be more different as Bertens was living a really difficult moment of her career, with only 2 wins in the past twoelve weeks, while Golubic was on a roll, her results improving week from week and after having failed to qualify for her first WTA main draw in Palermo, she could make it here in Bad Gastein by winning all her matches in the qualies.
Yet no-one would believe the young Swiss could dictate the game and control the match as much as she eventually did. Bertens soon lost confidence and her errors increased as much as Golubic shots became more accurate and deep. Viktorija's one handed backhand was the shot of the match, she could do everything with it from drop-shots to powerful winners and the Dutch had no answer to the variety and consistence of her opponent despite the enormous gap in the ranking (around 200 places between the two).
The match was over really fast and the Swiss never looked as if she could lose it or feel the pressure of the moment. There's a lot of quality in her game and mental attitude, so it won't be surprising if we get to hear more from her in the future.On the following link, you find the post-match interview i took with her.

(WC) Lisa-Maria Moser def (Q) Elena Bogdan 7-6 (6) 2-6 6-4

The Austrian Wild Card, ranked 770 in the world lived her fairytale day, by defeating Romanian qualifier Elena Bogdan in a close and long match, which featured a lot of emotions and quality too. It was clear right after a few games tat the Austrian's ranking wasn't telling much about the real value of her level of tennis, because Moser showed a great fighting spirit and solid shots as well as smart solutions and class. On the other side of the net, the Romanian had much more experience on bigger stages, even though for both of them it was the first appereance on a WTA main draw.
After a really tight first set where the local player had to save a set point in the tie-break, the Romanian took the lead in the second by forcing Moser to hit more and more shots before hitting a winner, or, often, an error. As she said in her post-match interview that you find here, Lisa-Maria lost a bit of focus after the huge effort to win the first set and her level dropped.

In the third set the Romanian took the lead once more, but the Austrian didn't want to let the match go without fighting, she found her first serve back and a few aces made it easier to hold, while elegant and effective drop shots started to expose the Romanian movements to the net and her position really far from the baseline. The momentum suddenly moved to the Austrian side and the crowd supported her way to the win appreciating her brave attitude and shots, which in the end paid off by making her advance to the second round.

(2) Annika Beck def Shahr Peer 7-5 6-3

After the intense and quality-worthy match of the local youngster, this match failed to cope with the expectations given by the names featured. The German young hope played a solid match, which didn't show much more than consistence though, while Peer looked like the shadow of the former self, who few years ago was one win away from the top 10.
The two played a very similar game, based on flat and medium speed shots in the attempt to win for a shorter ball to attack, which rarely happened because of the ability of both to susbtain such rhythm. Nonetheless Peer looked to be the one to try and go for winners the most, but her attempts often ended up in errors, expecially with the forehand, which on the other hand was the shot that gave more points to her opponent.
Both girls struggled to hold serve for the whole match, but the reason of that wasn't due to great returns of serve, but to the instability of their serves: Beck in the case often hit double-faults, whose second serve would barely stay within the base line.
The match wasn't indeed pretty at all, but in the end the German could stay calmer on the important points and let Peer feel the pressure of those, so that she often committed unforced errors in such moments and that in the end gave the edge to Beck to win the match.

Alexandra Cadantu def Maria-Joao Koehler 6-2 6-4

This match was a really interesting one, expecially because it showed a great development in the career of the Romanian, whose game impressed me as much as her great attitude on court. Cadantu is indeed the kind of player that made it to the top 100 by winning match on her consistence, expecially in the ITF circuit, but this year she started to give glimpses of a newer attitude and game in WTA matches too (she routined future Wimbledon Finalist Lisiscki on the indoor clay of Katowice for exemple).
Her shots became a lot heavier and expecially with her forehand she can produce great pace and dictate the rally until she has the chance to close with winners. Her dropshots can be really effective and she rarely abuses of them and her first serve has grown stronger and it's pretty hard to read. Of course she still has flaws in her game, but she looks to be a hard worker and her strenght lies in the winning mentality, which motivates her as much on court as off and this match gave another proof of that. In the second set she was sailing to a straight sets win, when Koehler, with a burst of pride, started to hit heavier shots, painting the lines

from both wings and making the score tight again. Many players at this point would have waited for the storm to pass and hope it would be over before the match is, but Alexandra, after a couple of games of dizziness, got herself back and instead of letting the Portugues assaulting her, she started to change the rhythm of her shots costantly by using back and top spin, so that she could get closer to the base line and finally go for winners. On 4-4 she broke and went on serving for the match closing with a blasting ace.



Petra Martic def (4) Andrea Petkovic 6-7 (5) 7-5 6-3

There is so much to tell about this match between German former top ten and champion here in Bad Gastein a few years ago and the young Croatian hope, because the two played each other twice before and Martic won both of the matches, by recovering from a one sided first set loss. What's more both girls are known for the bad luck they sadly witnessed in the past because of numerous and serious injuries. Nonetheless, the match, which could have easily been the final with another draw, was clearly the most interesting round one match-up.
What really made this match interesting, though, wasn't the quality, because both players played way below their standards and way too many errors were hit from both sides, but the tension and dramatic developing of the match kept the crowd well aware. Under this light, Petkovic surely stood out and not for good.
I want to make it clear immediately, that I am not a fan of hers, so maybe I am biased, but her behaviour was quite rude even from a neutral point of view. She later said to have been ill, but I don't think that's an excuse.
Starting from the first set she look tense and she channelled her rage towards a ball kid as she yelled "are you dumb?" because he had left her towel on Petkovic's bag during the court-change. Then she said other bad things to ball boys because they were slow in giving her balls for serves (which was actually true, but not a reason to insult them).
She then went mad at the umpire, Nouni, because he gave her two warnings for losing time, once on serve and once on return, she started to question every call and was moaning about every line hit by Martic, but on the other hand she was hitting as many or more and never apologized for bad-bounce winners. She did even scream a couple of loud come-on's on Martic errors and double faults.
What's more I think she expected the crowd to be fully behind her, because she's German, a former top player and champion here, but after she insulted the kid, the crowd went tepid and more and more people were cheering for Martic. She looked really bothered by that and more than once made

gestures and faces to mock the crowd.
As for the match, it was much of a rollercoaster and Martic had to blame herself for the first set loss as she wasn't able to serve it out in all two attempts she had. In the second set, she once more failed to convert her advantage and she got broken back and tied at 5 games each, but at this point she could hold her serve and finally break for the second set.
In the third Andrea was quite unfocused and her fights with kids, crowd and umpire took away energies from her running, which was the way through which she could prevent Martic accelerations from becoming winners. What's more her shots started to be shorter and less accurate and by the end Martic could take full control of the set and close it and the match, without too much troubles.

Last week before WTA ending

Hot matches in cold Moscow

Firday means last working day for a lot of you, but for tennis fans it means Quarterfinals.
Ongoing this week it's the last Premier tournament of the year: Moscow's Kremlin Cup. A lot of action took place during the week with huge surprises as the first round losses of seed n°2 Marion Bartoli and home favourite Nadia Petrova (seeded 6th).

Arvidsson silents Russian fans

Swedish veteran Sofia Arvidsson is well known on the circuit for her great feeling with the indoor tournaments, but up to now she had always had her best results in the small tournament of Memphis (two titles there and one more final).
Coming from the quarterfinals in Linz she was surely looking for more here in Moscow and clearly showed to love the Russian atmosphere and court, since in her second round she defeated world top 10 and seed number 2 Marion Bartoli from France.

Today she was facing the last Russian hope for the home title, seed number 7 and two-year-ago runner up, Maria Kirilenko. Sofia, still busted from her great win against Bartoli, started very solid and took advantage of a not that great day from her opponent.
The Swedish broke early in the first set and capitalized that break flying on 5-3 up, when Kirilenko was called to serve to stay in the set, but failed by handing it with a horrible Double Fault.
In the second set, it looked as if the plot was set to be the same as in the first, but after breaking the Russian, Sofia let Kirilenko break back, giving some hope to the few people in the stands of the hall.
Arvidsson didn't get discouraged and kept playing her tennis and by giving pressure on Kirilenko's serve with a couple of great returns she broke again and went up 5-3, this time serving for the match.
Closing it wasn't an easy job, as Maria wouldn't let the Swedish simply go away with it, but despite a few chances to reopen the match, at the 4th Match Point Arvidsson could finally celebrate for her first semifinal here in Moscow. 6-3 6-3.

Wozniacki shakes but wins

2012 won't be remembered as a good year by Caroline and her fans, as less than 10 months ago she was world number 1 whist this week she's in Moscow way out of the top 10. The young Danish is a hard worker though and she didn't let all that take her down and as the great fighter she proved to be in the past years, she went here to Russia with the only aim of going the further possible in the draw.

Having dispatched in a very convincing fashion her friend Urzula Radwanska in the second round, she came into this quarterfinal as the real favourite against Slovakian world number 14 Dominika Cibulkova.
The first set seemed to reflect the forcasts: Wozniacki, who seems to love the slow surface of the Kremlin Cup, showed some of her best defensive skills and often could use Cibulkova's power to hit clean winners that from 2-2 let her win 4 games in a row to win the first set without even giving the Slovakian the chance to break her serve once.
But Dominika is a fighter too, so she started the second set with a renewed attitude and finally could break Wozniacki and take the lead, but the Danish would break back and after a solid hold and another break of Cibulkova's serve, she went on serving for the match.
The next 3 games none of the two could win more than a point on her own serve, with Wozniacki set to make no point out of it on the tie-break neither, losing it by 7 points to 1.
All the momentum was then in the Slovakian's side of the net, but coulnd't hold it for long, as the former world number 1 looked far more focused in the 3rd set and astonished her opponent by running on every ball and retriving them with depth and power even from the FH side.
Cibulkova slowly faded from the court and it was all on her Caroline's hands, which didn't tramble again and so she could secure herself a place in the semifinals by winning for 6-2 6-7 (1) 6-1. She will meet Arvidsson tomorrow in a very Scandinavian match.
The other Semifinal will be played by Seed number 1 Sam Stosur, who dismantled Zakopalova 6-1 6-3, and seed 4 Ivanovic, who won the Serbian derby against Dolonc 6-4 6-1.

Luxembourg, tournament of rebirths?

In the last International event of the WTA season there was only one seed left after the 2nd round and it was Italian Roberta Vinci, number 1 in the seeding, who had to face in the last match of the day Venus Williams.
But let's start from the beginning: the first semifinalist of the tournament came out of Hantuchova vs Dominguez Lino's match, with the slovakian having reason of the spanish in straight sets 7-5 6-0.

Niculescu's game puzzles and wins

In the second match, last year's Runner Up, Monica Niculescu from Romania was facing Czech Lucie Hradecka. Niculescu, coming from a nightmarish season of injuries and bad luck started the week with only 11 wins in the whole year, but after a tough match against Swiss Oprandi in the opening round, she had stunned the second seed Goerges and went into this match with a new confidence.
Hradecka, who shocked 7th seed Paszek in the first round, seemed completely wicked by the uncommon game of the Romanian and spread a huge ammount of Unforced Errors in the first set won by Monica for 6 games to 0.
In the second Lucie could find a hint to deal with the insidious slices of Niculescu, but in the end it was the Romanian to close the match 6-0 6-4.

Andrea and Venus on their way back

If last year's runner up had to face a bad 2012, even a worse luck was the one to hit last year's top 10 Andrea Petkovic. The German, as you may know, has been forced out of the courts for the first few months of the year because of a back injury and during her very comeback in Stuttgart she injured her ankle, ending up forced away from courts for a few more months. Her few matches she had played so far, since the Us Open, hasn't been really convincing, but so it wasn't here in Luxenbourg, where the German had to play a long and tough match to make it through the first round against the talented Spanish Muguruza before scoring a very important win against Jelena Jankovic in the 2nd round.

In the quarterfinal she was facing another unlucky player for the season, Ksenia Pervak, whose citizenship's switch to Kazahstan didn't make any good for her sinking ranking. The two players started very tensiously, Petkovic opened the match with 2 double faults, which led to a break, immediatly followed by a rebreak on Pervak's serve.
The two slowly wore off the rust and showed some amazing rallies as they played a very similar game, made of solid groundstrokes and incredible defences, but at first it looked like Ksenia's FH was more inspired than Andrea's and she went up 3-2 40-0 on her own serve. A little slip of focus and a great reaction from the German cost the Kazhastan the break of lead and eventually the set, as the irritation deriving from this miss made her lose the calm she had in building up the points in the first half of the set, which meant a lot more free errors.
On the other side of the net, Petkovic, who's very well known for her smort tennis, understood the situation and didn't really have to do much more than keep the ball in play for a couple of shots, before Pervak would hit a flashing winner or, way more often, a bad error.

After the first set's win for 6-3, Andrea looked in fair control of the match and so it was until the end, with Pervak more and more asking too much from her shots and missing a lot more than what was actually staying on court. 6-3 6-2 the final score for the German, who will now face Venus Williams for a spot in the final.
In the last match of the night session the American had a tough time beating the n°1 seed Roberta Vinci, in a very thrilling and high quality match. The two battled with great serves and only in the 8th game we had the first break points and Venus didn't fail to convert them, but with a burst of pride the Italian fought back and took the set to the tiebreak.
There Williams has been too good and by hitting a couple of impressive winners and a pintch of luck (a really lucky netcord on a keypoint) she secured the first set.
In the second both of them kept fighting hard on serve and on return, but this time the variety of game and the fantasy of Vinci had to bow down to the power of Venus, who took the match in straight sets: 7-6 6-4.