===============
AUSTRALIAN OPEN
(Melbourne, Australia; outdoor hard (Plexicushion); Major)
=============== http://2008.australianopen.com/
Third round (Saturday 19th January)
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Nice winner, nice loser:
- ANNA CHAKVETADZE [6,EF] lt. MARIA KIRILENKO [27,DF],
7-6 (8/6) 1-6 2-6
I have uploaded to my website my new TV-report of this match, which I
recently acquired on DVD from Tennis Videos International
<http://www.users.bigpond.com/tennisvideos1/>.
It was a mouthwatering match - not just because Anna and Maria are
the two cutest players in the world, but in tennis-terms! The first
set was very high quality: Anna had the upper hand as her early,
flat, deceptive groundstrokes were difficult for Maria to read and
gave Maria little time to react.
But it was Anna who got tired after the first set, while Maria played
a brilliant second set: her down-the-line groundstrokes began to find
their mark, she mixed up the pace with high looping balls and sliced
backhands, and retrieved really well, while unforced errors crept
into Anna's game.
My full TV-report is at:
http://tinyurl.com/chakv-australian-open2008
It also includes reviews of Anna's first two matches (adding no new
information to the reports I posted here at the time).
--
Dr. Andrew Broad