Charleston [US], April 6 : No.12 seeded Paula Badosa defeated Leylah Fernandez to reach the third round of the Charleston Open for the third time in as many appearances.
Badosa produced a stunning performance to beat Fernandez 7-5, 7-6(6) in a match that lasted one hour and 51 minutes,
The No.12 seed will face 19-year-old Diana Shnaider, who knocked out former champion Veronika Kudermetova 6-4, 6-3 in a match that lasted one hour and 34 minutes.
Taking the ball early and conjuring up all manner of angles, Badosa won 12 of the first 15 points and left the Spard flat-footed. Toward the close of the first set and the beginning of the second, when she was down 4-2, a double fault gave the break back, and the forehand that had earlier tallied up winners started to falter.
Among Fernandez's 31 wins were some superbly spun volleys, and as she broke Badosa again and prompted a tiebreak, her forehand started to shine once more. Yet with 30 unforced errors, she was constantly on edge compared to the more steady Badosa, who had 15 wins and 18 unforced mistakes.
Badosa did find a forehand winner to save set point and reached match point after a net cord took Fernandez's drive volley over the baseline. The former World No. 2 converted it with her fourth service victory of the tiebreak.
"We always have battles. She plays so fast, she doesn't give me time. She was playing unbelievable, especially at the start. In the last games of the second set she started to go on the lines again," WTA.com quoted Badosa as saying.
"At the beginning I wasn't expecting that she'd start that well. I thought, OK, you have to serve very well and go for the shots before her. I started to be a little more aggressive, and it worked," she added.
Meanwhile, Shnaider came from a break down in both sets to defeat Kudermetova, who won her first title in Charleston in 2021. The teenager fired 19 winners in total mostly from her formidable forehand, but also coming up with touch at the net and on the drop shot.
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor