Three of the favorites had to stretch their duels as much as possible to reach the third round. The world number one was even 1-4 in the third set of her duel against Danielle Collins.
Thursday’s rainy day in Melbourne almost left out three of the tournament’s important faces, including world number one Iga Swiatek. Poland’s Alexander Zverev and Cameron Norrie had to reverse the score of their matches to ensure their qualification for the third round.
The four-time Grand Slam champion’s case was perhaps the most surprising, as Swiatek was 1-4 and came back in the third set. With an audience that largely supported her and Rod Laver who had to close his roof during the first set due to the rain, The number one in the ranking benefited from an improvement in her game and a clear decline from her rival. , stay alive. The game will have to improve if it is to go beyond the semi-finals achieved in Australia in 2022, its best result in the tournament. He ended up celebrating 6-4, 3-6 and 6-4 and write “Thriller” on the broadcast camera. He couldn’t have been more right.
Suspense that also reached other courts at Melbourne Park, because in the John Cain Arena, this velodrome transformed for the first major of the year, the best match so far of the Open took place. Alexander Zverev, sixth in the world, won for more than four hours against the player from qualifying, Lukas Klein. The German even reached the tie-break in the fourth set, trailing 2-1 in the sets. . History which repeated itself in the fifth, where he finally managed to seal another victory.
For Norrie, however, the situation was even more complex, as he started by losing the first two sets of his match against Giulio Zeppieri. Of course, he may have been lucky that rain suspended the match in two moments. Eventually, when action resumed, dominance still belonged to the English, who escaped trouble and advanced into Australia.
Unlike the three of them, the one who could not come back was Jessica Pegula, eliminated in the second round after losing to Clara Burel 6-4 and 6-2 in one hour and 10 minutes of play.
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Source: Latercera
I’m Rose Brown , a journalist and writer with over 10 years of experience in the news industry. I specialize in covering tennis-related news for Athletistic, a leading sports media website. My writing is highly regarded for its quick turnaround and accuracy, as well as my ability to tell compelling stories about the sport.
