By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Thursday January 18, 2022
The No.2 seed is taking the circuitous route to victory in Melbourne, but has reached the third round nevertheless.
Photo Source: Getty
On an afternoon that saw two of the top six seeds (No.3-seeded Muguruza and No.6-seeded Kontaveit) in the women’s singles draw sent packing, Aryna Sabalenka wobbled, perched once again on a precipice of her own making, but eventually survived a 19 double-fault performance, defeating China’s Wang Xinyu, 1-6, 6-4, 6-2.
Sabalenka has struggled mightily on serve this year, pouring in 70 double-faults in the four matches she has contested in 2022, including 31 in her first two rounds at the Australian Open.
But the World No.2 has been resilient. After rallying from a set and break down to defeat Storm Sanders in round one, she once again righted the ship and used her devastating ground game to roll past Want in one hour an 55 minutes.
Sabalenka hammered 33 winners and broke serve five times (four in the final two sets) to set a third-round encounter with Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic, the No.31 seed who defeated Russia’s Liudmila Samsonova 6-2, 7-5 on Day 4.
Remarkably, Sabalenka won 20 of the 29 second-serve points that did not see her double fault (20 of 48 overall).
The victory also marks the first time that Sabalenka has won from a set down on multiple occasions at the same Grand Slam event.
More to follow…