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Tag Angelique Kerber

Sport

Riske ousts Kerber, Mladenovic advances

Tennis
Zhengzhou (China), Sept. 10, 2019 (Reuters/NAN) American Alison Riske fought back from a set down to beat Germany’s Angelique Kerber 5-7 6-4 7-6(6) in the first round of the inaugural Zhengzhou Open on Tuesday.

The latest defeat in China extended the former world number one’s poor run of form.

Riske held her nerve to save a match point in the third set tie-break before going on to inflict a fourth consecutive first round defeat on Kerber.

The German was beaten by Kristina Mladenovic in her first match at the U.S. Open.

Kerber, a three-times Grand Slam champion, was beaten in the second round at Wimbledon.

She also suffered first round defeats in Toronto and Cincinnati in the run-up to the year’s final Grand Slam at Flushing Meadows.

On her part, Mladenovic made short work of Chinese wildcard Duan Yingying earlier in the day.

She won 6-2 6-3 to set up a second round meeting with fellow Frenchwoman and her former doubles partner Caroline Garcia.

“It was (They were) very tricky conditions. It’s super humid and it’s never easy to start a tournament,” said Mladenovic, who won 79 percent of her first serve points during the match.

“Every first round is difficult and Yingying, I’ve played (against) her in the past and she’s a very powerful player with a big serve.

“I think the key today was the consistency on my serve, and I managed to read hers well, which is her biggest weapon.”

Also, former French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko beat 23-year-old Chinese qualifier You Xiaodi 6-3 0-6 6-2 to reach the last 16, while France’s Fiona Ferro and Alize Cornet equally advanced. (Reuters/NAN)
VO/JPE/OLAL
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(Edited by Joseph Edeh and Olawale Alabi)

Sport

Unseeded American Collins hammers Kerber to reach Australian Open quarters

Collins

Melbourne (Australia), Jan. 20, 2019 (Reuters/NAN) Unseeded American Danielle Collins took less than an hour to thrash 2016 champion Angelique Kerber 6-0 6-2 and power her way into the quarter-finals of the Australian Open on Sunday.

The unheralded 25-year-old had not won a match in her previous Grand Slam appearances.

However, after smashing 29 winners against triple Grand Slam champion Kerber she has now made it to the last eight in her first main draw showing at Melbourne Park.

“I may not have won a Grand Slam match before this (but) I got to tell you I think it’s going to keep happening,” Collins said.

“When I was in college, my coaches told me to go out, go after it and believe in my shots.

“All kudos to my coaching squad over there in the corner, they gave me a plan and I just did the job.”

Ranked 35th in the world, Collins breezed through the opening set in 20 minutes with three service breaks, hitting winners on all sides of the court against the second seed.

After an early trade of breaks in the second set, Collins smashed a backhand to break Kerber’s serve and take a 4-2 lead.

She then broke the German once again to seal victory on her first match point in 56 minutes.

Wimbledon champion Kerber mumbled to herself constantly, unable to show any fight she threw down her racquet in frustration that brought a warning from the umpire.

“I go out fearless, I’ve been working hard my whole life, I just give it my all,” said Collins, after the match.

She will next play either fifth seed Sloane Stephens or Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, who meet in the last match of the evening. (Reuters/NAN)

KIA/HA

 

Sport

Kerber untroubled as her Australian Open quest gets underway

Kerber
Melbourne (Australia), Jan. 14, 2019 (Reuters/NAN) Angelique Kerber brandished her credentials as a title contender at the Australian Open with a straight-forward 6-2, 6-2 victory against Slovenia’s Polona Hercog on Monday.

The Wimbledon champion minimised her time under the hot sun, where temperatures surpassed 30 degrees celsius (86°F) during the day-time matches in Melbourne.

She thus secured the straight sets win in just over an hour.

Her opponent, a former top-50 player, was too erratic to trouble the three-times Grand Slam winner, committing almost three times as many unforced errors as Kerber.

She said her form improved during the match and her ball-striking was not side-tracked by the at-times inconsistent opponent.

“I played a lot of matches here already in Australia … I have my rhythm,” said Kerber, who played lead-up events in both Perth and Sydney.

Kerber was rarely challenged, and stepped up her relentless, grinding style on the handful of occasions she faced break points.

She moves into the next round without losing any service games.

She will play Brazilian qualifier Beatriz Haddad Maia in the second round in a battle between two left-handed counter-punchers who have not previously met. (Reuters/NAN)
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Sport

Tennis: Pliskova, Kerber upset in Montreal

Upset

Montreal (Canada), Aug. 9, 2018 (Reuters/NAN) The punishing serve that propelled Karolina Pliskova to the top of the tennis world last year proved ineffective against Kiki Bertens at the Rogers Cup in Montreal on Wednesday.

The Dutchwoman simply cruised to a 6-2 6-2 victory against her Czech opponent.

Pliskova, ninth seed,  failed to record a single ace in the second-round battle but committed eight double faults and was broken seven times by the defensive-minded Bertens.

Bertens will next meet eighth-seed Petra Kvitova, who advanced past Estonian Anett Kontaveit 6-3 6-4 in their second-round battle on Tuesday.

Wimbledon champion Angelique Kerber came crashing back to earth after she beat Serena Williams in the grasscourt final last month, falling 6-4 6-1 to Alize Cornet of France.

The fourth-seeded German committed 32 errors to help Cornet reach the third round, where she will face Australia’s Ashleigh Barty, who defeated Belgian Alison Van Uytvanck 7-6(7) 6-2 in her second-round match.

Romanian Mihaela Buzarnescu was forced to retire from her second-round match against fifth-seeded Elina Svitolina with the score 6-3 6-7(5) 4-3 after she suffered a right ankle injury.

The 30-year-old slipped on the baseline while running down a shot and immediately collapsed in tears.

She eventually left the court in a wheelchair, waving to the crowd as it rose to give her a standing ovation.

The unseeded Maria Sharapova made quick work of fellow Russian Daria Kasatkina during their first meeting with a convincing 6-0 6-2 win.

She will now face sixth seed Caroline Garcia of France in the third round on Thursday.

Third-seeded Sloane Stephens thrashed 21-year-old Francoise Abanda, dispatching the Canadian 6-0 6-2 in 80 minutes.

The 25-year-old American is looking to sharpen her game ahead of her U.S. Open title defence after disappointing results at Wimbledon and the Citi Open last month.

Rain forced two late matches to be halted, with top seed Simona Halep trailing Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 4-3, and British number one Johanna Konta leading Victoria Azarenka 6-3 3-0.

Both second-round matches will resume on Thursday. (Reuters/NAN)

KIA

Sport

Wimbledon: Kerber reaches final as Ostapenko self-destructs

Final

London, July 12, 2018 (Reuters/NAN) Germany’s Angelique Kerber proved too solid for error-strewn Latvian Jelena Ostapenko as she reached her second Wimbledon final with a 6-3 6-3 victory on Thursday.

The 30-year-old was gifted point after point as Ostapenko’s aggressive game backfired in a blaze of unforced errors.

A tight tussle looked in store at 3-3 in the first set but when Ostapenko fired a forehand long to drop serve the match quickly ran away from her.

She double-faulted on set point and Kerber, who served well and defended superbly when required to fend off Ostapenko’s sporadic attacks, accelerated into a 5-1 lead.

Ostapenko suddenly began to land some big blows, clawing back a couple of games and had a point to narrow the deficit to a single game as Kerber showed late nerves.

But Kerber nipped the recovery in the bud and booked a Saturday date back on Centre Court when Ostapenko rammed a forehand wide.

She will face either seven-time champion Serena Williams or fellow German Julia Georges in the final. (Reuters/NAN)
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(Editing by Peter Ejiofor)

Sport

Roland Garros: Kerber downs Garcia to end French’s singles title hopes

Kerber
Paris, June 4, 2018 (Reuters/NAN) Angelique Kerber ended the French presence in the singles draws at Roland Garros when she saw off seventh seed Caroline Garcia 6-2 6-3 in the fourth round on Monday in Paris.

The German former world number one, seeded 12th, played from the back of the court throughout the match, making it impossible for her 24-year-old opponent to develop her attacking game.

Double Grand Slam champion Kerber will next face world number one Simona Halep after the Romanian demolished Belgian Elise Mertens 6-2 6-1.

Kerber only hit 11 winners but Garcia made 36 unforced errors, meaning the German was never under too much pressure.

Garcia had reached two semi-finals in top-tier events on clay this season, but in front of her home fans on Court Suzanne Lenglen she was unable to produce her best tennis.

The Frenchwoman briefly threatened a comeback when she pulled a break back for 5-3 after saving four match points.

But then she sent a routine forehand wide on the fifth match point in the following game.

“I’m happy to be through. She has played really well in the last few months,” Kerber said of Garcia, who had reached the quarter-finals last year.

All of the French players in the men’s singles draw were knocked out of the tournament before reaching the fourth round.(Reuters/NAN)
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(Edited by Olawale Alabi)

Sport

2018 Australian Open: Kerber back in quarter-finals club after tough year

NAN-S-14
Kerber
Abuja, Jan. 22, 2018 (Reuters/NAN) Former champion Angelique Kerber was driven to distraction by the unorthodox game of world number 88 Hsieh Su-wei but she still overhauled the Taiwanese battler 4-6 7-5 6-2 on Monday.

The German 21st seed was being tied up in knots by double-sided Hsieh’s angles and slices.

But her raw power prevailed at a sunbathed Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne to reach the quarter-finals of the Australian Open.

The 2016 champion’s next opponent may be far more to her liking than Hsieh, whose dazzling marksmanship left Kerber shrieking in frustration throughout much of the two-hour and eight-minute clash.

U.S. Open finalist Madison Keys, a fellow baseline-basher, has never taken a set off Kerber in five hard court encounters.

Kerber was barely able to win three matches on the bounce through a dismal 2017.

But she has now strung together nine in a row in a dramatic return to form under the stewardship of new coach Wim Fissette.

She returns to the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam for the first time since her run to the 2016 U.S. Open title and audacious heist of Serena Williams’s world number one ranking.

“You know, it’s great to being back in the quarters again,” the 30-year-old told reporters.

“I had a tough off-season, and right now I try to enjoy it.

“I just try to play like 2016 a little bit, like not doing too many things to complicate it. Not thinking too much about everything. Just going there, doing my job.”

It could easily have been a bad day at the office for the German, as Hsieh, the oldest woman left in the draw, chased her own piece of history at the age of 32.

She came close to becoming Taiwan’s first woman to reach a Grand Slam quarter-final.

Her double-handed style had befuddled Wimbledon champion Garbine Muguruza in the second round and Kerber was similarly bemused as she fell 3-1 behind.

After wrong-footing Kerber with a string of baseline drop shots, Hsieh leaned back and laconically slapped a forehand winner.

It helped her to claim a second set point and she duly converted it with a lucky net cord.

Her weak serve was a problem, though, and Kerber began to exploit it.

The Taiwanese saved four break points at 2-2 but dropped serve in the seventh game with a backhand into the tramlines.

Kerber handed the break back in a hail of unforced errors and her incessant grunting grew to ear-splitting levels in a sign of the pressure.

In the end it was a gift from Hsieh on deuce at 5-5 that cracked open the match.

It came through an unforced error which gave Kerber a window and she smashed through it with a rocketed forehand down the line.

A huge serve wrapped up the set and Hsieh’s range slowly began to desert her.

A cross-court backhand fell wide by a half-inch to allow Kerber to break to 2-1.

The miss seemed to sap the energy of Hsieh whose serves were barely clearing the net by the end, thus becoming easy pickings for the now marauding Kerber.

Hsieh saved two match points to hold serve in a late burst of resistance but surrendered in the next game when Kerber rushed forward for the easiest of passing shots.(Reuters/NAN)
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(Edited by Dorcas Jonah and Olawale Alabi)