Maria Sharapova’s encouraging clay form continued as she came back from a set down to beat Dominika Cibulkova 3-6 6-4 6-2 at the Italian Open.
The Russian, who beat Irina-Camelia Begu and Kristina Mladenovic en route to the Madrid quarter-final last week, will move up to at least World No.39 when the new rankings are released next Monday.
Sharapova is starting to show the kind of form that kept her in the top ten for much of her career before her well-publicised ban.
And she responded superbly after playing poorly during the first set, which she lost due to a solitary break for Cibulkova in the second game.
After seven games went with serve in the second set, there was a spell of three pivotal games which ultimately decided the match.
Sharapova won the first thanks to some huge ball-striking, although it took her four break points to do it because Cibulkova determinedly saved three.
The Slovakian then won the second by playing a perfect return game to break the Russian to love.
But Sharapova did not let it bother her. She demonstrated her champion qualities to immediately break Cibulkova again and level the match.
The five-time Grand Slam champion knew the importance of her next service game, and she let out a loud cry of ‘come on!’ after saving two break points during a gutsy hold.
She then gathered even more momentum by breaking Cibulkova to go 2-0 up, and never looked back thereafter. After three comfortable holds, she broke the Slovakian to love in the tenth game to seal an excellent win.
“I was really happy at the end of today’s match,” Sharapova said in her press conference. “I thought there were a lot of good things to take away from it.”
“(I was pleased with) the competitiveness against a player that I thought competed and played really well and played some of her best tennis for a long stretch of time.”
“That was a really good compliment, in a sense. I don’t think she’s been producing that type of tennis in the last few months. And to come out today and to play that way – I expect that from a lot of players. And I thought I delivered quite well. So that makes me happy.”
The Russian’s last-16 opponent will be Daria Gavrilova after the Australian ground out an extraordinary 5-7 6-2 7-6(6) win over Garbine Muguruza in a marathon match that lasted three hours and 11 minutes.
After the day session overran by nearly two hours, the players were unable to begin until 10.50pm. Given this, the World No.3 looked understandably grumpy at times and did not produce anything like her best tennis.
However, Muguruza looked like she had found a way to win when she opened up a 4-0 lead in the decider. But Gavrilova refused to give in and fought her way back to 4-4, and then saved two match points before sealing victory in the tie-break.
Venus and Kerber survive
Grand Slam champions Venus Williams and Angelique Kerber both dug deep to earn important wins at the Foro Italico.
Venus had to break to stay in the match when opponent Elena Vesnina was serving for it at 5-4 in the decider. And she produced her best tennis when it mattered most to gain a 6-2 4-6 7-5 victory.
Kerber worked even harder for her win over Begu. The Romanian comfortably won the first set 6-3 in 34 minutes and looked set to cause an upset.
But the German refused to give in. She battled to 7-5 scorelines in both of the next two sets, each lasting over an hour, to struggle through to a meeting with Karolina Pliskova’s conqueror Maria Sakkari in round three.
Elsewhere in Rome, Caroline Wozniacki eased to a 6-1 6-4 victory over Alison Van Uytvanck to set up a third round meeting with Anastasija Sevastova, who beat Aleksandra Krunic 6-4 6-4.
