PETE ZIEBRON in CINCINNATI
Polish #2 Jerzy Janowicz at the W&S Open in Cincinnati. Pete Ziebron Images
Jerzy Janowicz of Poland defeated 12th seeded Belgian Steve Darcis 6-3 6-1 in 61 minutes to advance to the 2nd round of the qualifiction round on an unseasonably cool day at the Western & Southern Open today in Cincinnati. Janowicz pounded 12 aces and converted 5 of 6 break point opportunities to easily beat Darcis, who recently upset world #7 Tomas Berdych in the 1st round of The Olympic Games.
Today's win was Janowicz' 11th consecutive victory and his 16th in his last 17 matches. Last month, Janowicz won 2 Challenger clay-court tournaments in consecutive weeks in Scheveningen, The Netherlands and in Poznan, Poland. Prior to these titles, Janowicz advanced through all 3 rounds of qualifying at Wimbledon, defeated Ernests Gulbis in the 2nd round and held a 2 sets to 1 lead on Florian Mayer in the 3rd round before running out of gas, losing the 5th set 5-7.
Jerzy Janowicz opens play on the Grandstand Court at 10 AM on Sunday, facing 63rd ranked Marinko Matosevic of Australia. Earlier today, Matosevic came from a set down to defeat German Benjamin Becker.
Meanwhile, world #105 Sesil Karatantcheva of Kazakhstan continues to win consecutive games in double digit fashion against significantly higher ranked opponents. Today, Karatantcheva was down 3-6 2-5 against world #64 Arantxa Rus of The Netherlands before she surged to win the last 11 games of the match to stun Rus and the crowd watching on Court 6 in the mid-afternoon. Rus served for the match, up a double break at 5-2 in the 2nd set and would be broken in this game as well as the next 5 times she served.
Last week in Montreal, Karatantcheva dropped only 14 games in 3 qualifying matches before destroying world #38 Sorana Cirstea of Romania 6-0 6-0 in her opening main draw match. In her next contest, Karatantcheva dropped a 6-4 6-4 decision to 16th seeded Lucie Safarova, who is still alive in Montreal and faces Li Na in the semifinals on Sunday.
Karatantcheva, a former quarterfinalist at Roland Garros, faces Olga Govortsova of Belarus at 10 AM on Sunday on Court 9 in the 2nd round of qualification for a spot in the Western & Southern Open main draw.
After winning 11 of the first 16 games of the match, Arantxa Rus drops the final 11 consecutive games. Pete Ziebron Images
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