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Jelena Ostapenko brought quite a challenge to the table, but came up short at the Australian Open Thursday against Belinda Bencic. The Swiss overcame a barrage of heavy hitting from the Latvian to win 7-5, 7-5 on Margaret Court Arena at Melbourne Park.
The two stars last met back at Indian Wells in 2018, where they played a three-setter - with the former French Open champion winning by a landslide in the third. But Bencic has improved considerably since then, breaking into the top 10 in 2019 and reaching her maiden Slam semifinal at the US Open.
Despite some struggles against Anna Schmiedlova in the first round, the Swiss found her way to a straight-sets win.
Ostapenko recorded her first double fault of the match right off the bat and fell behind 0-40 with an error and a bad challenge. She recovered with a good stretch shot near the net but gave up another error that handed Bencic the break.
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The sixth seed doubled her lead with a hold to love and had to fight on deuce to gain a 3-0 hold over the Latvian. But Ostapenko managed to hold the Swiss star off in the fourth, finally getting on the board with a break. She then added two more games in a row to go level at 3-3.
More pressure on the sixth seed marked a fourth consecutive game for the Latvian, but that changed quickly as Bencic took over from there. Mistakes from Ostapenko gave the Swiss star a shot at the set with a service game to come.
The Latvian showed some good defense and killed Bencic's window of opportunity with another break. However, she then fell behind again with a string of errors, giving the Swiss another break.
A chance to force a tiebreak went begging for Ostapenko as she let a critical point get away from her. Bencic once again found her moment to strike and did so, winning 7-5 after 47 minutes.
The two combined for nine double faults but the first serve of Bencic was stronger, with more than two-thirds of points won. She was also five out of five at the net.
The two stayed on serve to start the second set but a stumble from Bencic gave Ostapenko a whiff in the fourth game. After missing a couple of key shots, the Swiss committed her seventh double fault that gave Ostapenko a 3-1 lead.
The margin increased for the Latvian as she consolidated the break with a strong service hold. With three consecutive games lost, Bencic seemed to be struggling, but she managed to get a hold in the sixth. Ostapenko responded with a hold of her own that made it 5-2, threatening to force a decider.
However, Bencic held to keep the set alive and induced some nerves in Ostapenko, who got broken while serving for the set. Bencic completed the comeback by leveling at five games apiece before winning the 11th to come within touching distance of a straight sets win.
She got it done by setting up two match points and then hammering an ace, to end the match in 1 hour and 41 minutes.
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