Sharapova settles down to earn 600th win
Maria Sharapova has 16 aces and scored 37 of 47 first point serves as she moved past American Lauren Davis in three sets to earn a match against No. 12 Belinda Bencic in the fourth round.
Sharapova breezed through the first set against Davis but was caught in a battle in a second before settling back down to earn her 600th career win to beat Davis 6-1, 6-7 (5-7), 6-0.
Sharapova averaged a serve nearly 10 miles per hour faster than her opponent, but was held back in the second set but unforced errors, of which she committed 42 in the match.
Nishikori overcomes wrist injury in battle with Garcia-Lopez
It was No. 7 Kei Nishikori’s return speed against No. 26 Guillermo Garcia-Lopez that created such an interesting chess match in the third round of the Australian Open. Despite battling a wrist injury, which eventually forced him to get treatment before losing the second set, Nishikori was able to rip returns past Garcia-Lopez regularly, but when Garcia-Lopez was able to get in front of one of the returns he was able to set the ball across the court where Nishikori was unable to get.
Garcia-Lopez also sent down 11 aces, but 32 unforced errors and Nishikori’s superiority in second serves was the difference in a close match that lasted two hours and 48 minutes as the 26-year-old from Japan earned the 7-5, 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory.
Nishikori had trouble with his right wrist and had to take a medical timeouts, but recovered and won the third and fourth sets to advance to the fourth round of the Australian Open. Nishikori has gone as deep as the quarterfinals in Melbourne at both the 2012 and 2015 events. He will next play No. 9 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, who beat french qualifer Pierre-Hugues Herbert 6-4, 7-6 (9-7), 7-6 (7-4) to advance to the fourth round.
Federer gets best of Dimitrov, Djokovic beats Seppi
No. 3 Roger Federer lost a tight second set on his own doing after failing to convert one of his three break points and committing 18 unforced errors. But outside of that troubling second set Federer cruised past his Bulgarian opponent.
After the first set was delayed for rain and the ball boys had to dry the court off with towels, Federer earned the 6-4 first set victory but bounced back from his second set loss with fairly dominant performances to win 6-4, 3-6, 6-1, 6-4.
Errors plagued Federer throughout the entire match, committing 55 of them, but he was 73-percent on his net approach, scored 48 winners and smacked down 13 aces.
The third round of last year’s Australian Open was where Andreas Seppi sent shock waves through the tournament when he upset Federer, but even though he is much improved this year he was unable to create more magic as No. 1 Novak Djokovic got the 6-1, 7-5, 7-6 (8-6) victory to move on.
Williams and Radwanska cruise into fourth round
No. 1 Serena Williams hasn’t even been tested yet in her three matches at the Australian Open. Williams hit six aces, won 96-percent of her first serve points and 93-percent of her second points. She was perfect in her net approaches in her 6-1, 6-1 victory over Daria Kasatkina.
No. 5 Agnieszka Radwańska shut Monica Puig out in the second set to advance to the fourth round of the Australian Open, 6-4, 6-0. Puig committed 13 unforced errors in the second set. Radwańska scored on 10 of her 11 first serves.
Corey Johns
Latest posts by Corey Johns (see all)
- My Ultimate Historic March Madness Bracket - March 17, 2020
- Baseball analytics have gone too far - April 4, 2019
- AAF’s failure doesn’t mean alt football won’t work - April 3, 2019