Serena Williams eased into the third round of this year’s women’s singles championship at Wimbledon on Wednesday, while No 2 seed Caroline Wozniacki suffered a shock defeat.
Multiple Wimbledon champion, Williams, showed little mercy in wrapping up her second-round match in just over an hour.
She brushed aside Bulgarian Viktoriya Tomova 6-1 in the opening set after breaking serve on two occasions. The second was a bit tougher for Williams, but it was nothing that she could not handle. Williams had multiple chances to break Tomova’s serve, but she only needed the one as the Bulgarian did not trouble her on her own serve. Williams could not convert on the first two match-points she had, but it was third time lucky as she claimed a 6-1, 6-4 victory.
Wozniacki, however, did not reach the third round as the Australian Open champion crashed out after being on the wrong end of a three-set thriller against Ekaterina Makarova.
Wozniacki lost her serve twice in the opening six games of the match to trail 5-1. She got one of them back but it was not enough as Makarova claimed the first set 6-4.
Wozniacki was ruthless in the second and broke Makarova twice to level the match at one set a piece with a 6-1 second set scoreline.
The third started the same way as the first, with Makarova sprinting to a 5-1 lead, but Wozniacki stormed back by winning the next four games. Makarova held serve the next game, but Wozniacki ― while serving to stay in the match ― could not save two match-points and went down 4-6, 6-1, 5-7.
In the men’s singles, defending champion Roger Federer did not have to save a single break-point in his straight-sets victory over Lukas Lacko.
Federer made it look very easy as it took him just 92 minutes to ease his way into the third round with a 6-4, 6-4, 6-1 victory. The Swiss looks like he hasn’t even reached second gear yet and it would take a brave man to bet against him claiming another title at SW19.
South Africa’s Kevin Anderson dropped a set against Andreas Seppi, but he was leading by two sets to one when rain interrupted play with the score 1-1 in the fourth set.
Other selected women’s results:
Venus Williams defeated Alexandra Dulgheru 4-6, 6-0, 6-1
Madison Keys defeated Luksika Kumkhum 6-4, 6-3
Lucie Safarova defeated Agnieszka Radwanska 7-5, 6-4
Kiki Bertens defeated Anna Blinkova 6-4, 6-0
Other selected men’s results:
Milos Raonic defeated John Millman 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4)
Gael Monfils defeated Paolo Lorenzi 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (3)
Sam Querrey defeated Sergiy Stakhovsky 7-6 (4), 6-3, 6-3
Dennis Novak defeated Lucas Pouille 6-4, 6-2, 6-7 (8), 3-6, 6-2
Photo: Wimbledon.com
