French Open Day 7: Tracking the progress of seeded players (Women’s singles)

ONES WHO PRO’SEED’ED

#2 Maria Sharapova (Russia)

The No.2 seed faced some resistance from China’s Zheng Jie in the second set which lasted 70 minutes as she dug deep to ensure the match didn’t go to a decider, winning 6-1 7-5. Zheng could not manage a single service hold in the first set as Sharapova broke her 4 times to quickly wrap it up 6-1; the only game she won was by breaking the Russian’s serve. Sharapova was 4/4 on break points in Set 1.

The 2^nd set was a break-fest with both Zheng and ‘Shara’ trading breaks all through – Zheng broke the Russian’s serve 3 times, while Maria continued to stay perfect with 4 breaks from as many break points. Sharapova also threw in 6 double faults in the 2^nd set alone (she had 8 in total) to aid Zheng’s fightback. She finally managed to consolidate and serve out the match after breaking the Chinese for the 8^th time in the match in the 11^th game of the second set.

Sharapova has had trouble all season with that serve of hers. She is into Week 2, but plenty of work and improvement will be required if she is to harbour any hopes of retaining her crown.

#3 Victoria Azarenka (Belarus)

‘Vika’ ran into trouble, losing the first set to French No.31 seed Alize Cornet, but rebounded to win 4-6 6-3 6-1. The match was a scrappy affair that was up and down for the most part with momentum shifting either way. Both struggled on their 2^nd serves – Cornet won only 33% of points on it, while Azarenka was only slightly better off at 37%. On top of that, Azarenka had 10 double faults to add to her agony.

Holding serve proved to be a huge task for either player as they constantly found themselves under the pump – Cornet fashioned 16 break point opportunities, converting 6 of them while Azarenka had 20, converting 9. Azarenka was a +10 (41-31) though in Winners-Unforced Errors as against -4 (28-32) for her opponent.

#12 Maria Kirilenko (Russia)

Beat Stefanie Voegele of Switzerland 7-6 (3) 7-5 in 2 tough sets to make it through to Round 4. She is yet to get past the 4^th round here, having exited at this stage in both 2010 and 2011.

#17 Sloane Stephens (USA)

Stephens is back to where it all began; it was here at last year’s French championships where the teenager initially carved out a name for herself when she made the 4^th round. Now, in her 2^nd visit, she is there once again after a hard-fought 6-4 6-7 (5) 6-3 win over unseeded Maria Erakovic of New Zealand.

TRIVIA

The USA has 4 women players in the round of 16 in Paris for the first time since 2004 – Serena Williams, Sloane Stephens, Jamie Hampton and Bethanie Mattek-Sands.

Sloane Stephens, for the first time since Melbourne where she reached the semi-finals, has now won 3 matches in a row.