PARIS: Ninth seed
Agnieszka Radwanska
lived up to her nickname as the 'Professor' when she dug deep into her toolbox of tactics to repel tenacious qualifier
Alison Van Uytvanck
6-7(3) 6-2 6-3 in the
French Open second round on Thursday.
The world number 10 was taken by surprise in the first set when the aggressive Belgian, ranked 103 spots below her, went 3-1 up and squandered four break points to go 4-1 up.
Despite fighting back, Radwanska could not handle her opponent's big kicking serve and stream of dropshots and Van Uytvanck bagged the tiebreak with a smash.
Radwanska, whose best
grand slam
performance was reaching the 2012 Wimbledon final, changed tactics and decided to mix it up as well, rushing to the net more often and attacking the Belgian's high-bouncing serve early to race through the second set 6-2.
The 23-year-old Van Uytvanck, who underwent wrist surgery in December and has made only one WTA main draw appearance this year prior to
Roland Garros
, was broken in the third game and the Pole never looked back, winning the match when her opponent dumped a backhand into the net after two hours and 23 minutes.
Start a Conversation
Post comment