Fit, fresh Wozniacki shines in Paris

Top Stories

Fit, fresh Wozniacki shines in Paris

Caroline Wozniacki, leading the chasing pack in pursuit of the Williams sisters, shrugged off ankle injury concerns to sweep into the French Open second round on Monday.

By (AFP)

  • Follow us on
  • google-news
  • whatsapp
  • telegram

Published: Mon 24 May 2010, 5:39 PM

Last updated: Mon 6 Apr 2015, 9:08 AM

The 19-year-old Dane reeled off the first seven games of the match before clinching a 6-0, 6-3 win over Russian world 78 Alla Kudryavtseva, the 69-minute victory proving a crucial confidence-booster for the third seed.

Wozniacki came into Paris having retired from the Warsaw event last week with a recurrence of the ankle injury which also cut short her Charleston campaign and has cast a shadow over her entire claycourt season.

A second-round loss in Madrid sapped her optimism while also helping Venus Williams displace her as world number two.

Wozniacki, dressed by Stella McCartney and sporting red nail polish, broke Dostoevsky-reading Kudryavtseva three times in the first set, which was wrapped up in 25 minutes.

The Russian, best known for knocking Maria Sharapova out of Wimbledon in 2008, rallied to break at 2-1 in the second set, but Wozniacki hit back immediately before cruising through the rest of the match.

Jelena Dokic, now a member of the women’s tour seniors club, slumped to a dispiriting first-round exit, but vowed to keep playing despite having won just one match on the main tour this year.

The 27-year-old Australian went down to a 6-2, 6-2 defeat against Czech 24th seed Lucie Safarova and then set her sights on qualifying for Wimbledon, 11 years after her breakthrough at the All England Club where she stunned Martina Hingis.

“Outside of facing a top five player, this was one of the worst draws I could have got. She’s having a great claycourt season and a great season generally,” said Dokic, the world 115.

Dokic came into the French Open having seen her season plagued by illness and an elbow injury.

She played just one claycourt event, a low-key Challenger in the Czech Republic.

“I have only played four tournaments all year. But I need to keep practising and move on from this. I only started hitting three weeks ago while others were playing.”

Also safely through is Chinese number one Li Na, the 11th seed, who defeated last year’s junior champion Kristina Mladenovic of France 7-5, 6-3.

Later Monday, world number one and defending champion Roger Federer starts his campaign for a 17th Grand Slam title when he tackles Australia’s Peter Luczak.

Third seed Novak Djokovic, laid low recently by an allergy, takes on Kazakhstan’s Evgeny Korolev while British fourth seed Andy Murray faces a tough opener against France’s flamboyant shot-maker Richard Gasquet.

Women’s top seed Serena Williams, the 2002 champion, meets Switzerland’s Stefanie Voegele.


More news from