Tuesday 1 May 2012

Heather Watson beats Lucie Hradecka in Estoril

Heather Watson
The first round of the Estoril Open has wrapped up with all eight seeds progressing safely to the second round.  Kaia Kanepi produced the most impressive scoreline on day 2 as she defeated the promising American youngster Sloane Stephens, 6-1 6-0 in just 47 minutes.  Polona Hercog also scored a bagel in a one sided victory against the out-of-form Tamira Paszek, 6-3 6-0.  Anabel Medina Garrigues, Zheng Jie, Petra Cetkovska, Maria Kirilenko and Jarmila Gajdosova all progressed in straight sets.  Zheng won a surprisingly straightforward encounter with the in-form Ekaterina Makarova, 6-3 6-1, meanwhile Kirilenko was forced to save 4 set points in the first set to get past Elena Baltacha, 7-6 6-1.  

There was some joy for the Brits though as Heather Watson enjoyed an impressive 6-4 6-4 victory over the dangerous, Lucie Hradecka.  This was her fourth win on the clay having come through qualifying and she will now play Petra Cetkovska in the second round.  Watson struggled for form in the early part of 2012, but two excellent wins over Sorana Cirstea and Lucie Safarova in Miami appear to have reignited her season.

Round-up from other tournaments:
WTA Budapest - Three seeds (Tsvetana Pironkova, Shahar Peer and Irina-Camelia Begu) have already departed the competition in Hungary along with the promising youngster, Timea Babos.
ATP Estoril - The top four seeds all received byes in the first round so the schedule so far has been dominated by Portugese players today.
ATP Munich - Nikolay Davydenko was the only seed to fall on day two as Marcos Baghdatis, Mikhail Youzhny and Ernests Gulbis all reached the second round.

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