TENNIS FERNCH OPEN – To be Caroline Wozniacki right now must be a very difficult prospect. She was publicly dumped by her famous ex-fiancé, Irish professional golfer Rory McIlroy last week and she was just ousted in the 1st round of the French Open by Yanina Wickmayer. Cordell Hackshaw
Interviews, Results, OOP, Draws from the Roland Garros
To be Caroline Wozniacki right now must be a very difficult prospect. She was publicly dumped by her famous ex-fiancé, Irish professional golfer Rory McIlroy last week. His official statement on the matter was jarring and almost a proverbial slap in the face for the Danish tennis star. Adding insult to injury, McIlroy won the prestigious BMW PGA Championships making headlines this weekend whilst Wozniacki, the 13th seed, was just ousted in the 1st round of the French Open in spectacular fashion. Much would be made of the Dane’s defeat especially as she literally wore her heartache on her sleeve. Her outfit for the match was coincidentally the Irish colours; green, white and orange. However, like her recent relationship, she found no luck with the Irish. Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium knocked her out 7-5 4-6 6-2 in just over two hours.
Despite the fact that Wozniacki owns a 6-1 lifetime record against Wickmayer, this was bound to be a very difficult match. Wozniacki is also nursing a knee injury to go along with her bruised heart. Nonetheless, the Dane did start the match well. She knows the Wickmayer game and so steered towards the Belgian’s weak backhand. Wozniacki soon had triple break points. She converted on the 3rd one and jumped out to an early 2-0 lead. However, Wickmayer showed that she learned a few times from her “new coach” fellow Belgian, retired 4-time major winner Kim Clijsters who has had great success against Wozniacki. Wickmayer broke back and got to 2-2. Wozniacki broke her once more and matters mostly flip-flopped between the two players for most of the set. Wozniacki does not have any big weapons but she is a great defensive player as well as patient. Her opponent possesses a huge forehand but was prone to misfire on that shot as she became increasingly impatient and erratic. This allowed Wozniacki to serve for the set at 6-5. However, Wickmayer broke again to force the tiebreaker where she quickly raced to a 6-3 lead and closed it out on her serve 7-6(5).
Wickmayer became a different player in the 2nd set as she took more calculated risk and appeared to be more confident on her backhand which was under constant scrutiny. They remained on serve till the 10th game when Wozniacki increased the pressure on Wickmayer who was serving to stay in the set 4-5. Wozniacki converted her first set point 6-4 to take matters to a 3rd set. In the 3rd set, Wickmayer finally found the right balance of controlled aggression and wrest control of the match. Wozniacki was serving poorly as she barely won points on her serve; 8/22 for the set. Wickmayer quickly broke her to open the set and was soon ahead 4-2. She broke Wozniacki for the 3rd time in the set for 5-2 and served it out 7-6 4-6 6-2 for a place in the 2nd round.
After the match, Wozniacki stated that she will not answer any questions regarding her personal life in the press conference. She offered up this explanation for her performance instead “I just tried to prepare the best that I could, and really tried to focus on my match and on what I had to do out there … [I]t doesn’t make it easier that I haven’t been able to play really that many matches because I have been injured … I felt a little bit rusty out there, and, you know, it wasn’t really a pretty match.” Wickmayer faces Silvia Soler-Espinoza of Spain in the 2nd round. Wozniacki will now have an early start for preparation for Wimbledon.
