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Daria Gavrilova

Daria Gavrilova Pleases Home Fans With Continued Australian Open Run

January 22, 2016 by TennisGrandstand

by Kevin Craig

@KCraig_Tennis

 

Daria Gavrilova kept Australian tennis fans’ hopes alive for a deep run as she was able to defeat the No. 28 seed Kristina Mladenovic, 6-4, 4-6, 11-9 on Friday at the Australian Open to advance to the round of 16. Gavrilova has been the sole Australian representative in the women’s singles draw since Tuesday, as she was the only Australian woman to advance out of the first round.

In the first set, Gavrilova and Mladenovic exchanged breaks in each of their second service games before Gavrilova would go on to break in the seventh game and hold on to that lead to close out the set. The efficient 32-minute first set included zero deuce games and only saw two games in which the loser of the game got to 30.

The second set was more tightly contested as the first game lasted nine points before Mladenovic was able to hold. Gavrilova then held for 1-1, the last hold before four consecutive breaks were exchanged. After being down a break twice and battling back both times, Mladenovic went on to get a break in the tenth game and close out the second set, forcing a decider.

Gavrilova and Mladenovic wound up playing the longest third set of the women’s singles tournament at the Australian Open as they needed 20 games to decide a winner. Once again, Gavrilova was able to break early in the set, but was unable to consolidate as she was broken right back by Mladenovic to get the set to 1-1. There was minimal trouble on serve until Gavrilova broke Mladenovic again to go up 5-4 and have a shot at serving out the match. Her consolidation troubles continued, though, she was broken at 15 and Mladenovic prolonged the match. Finally at 9-9, Gavrilova got the decisive break to go up 10-9 and went on to hold to make her first fourth round at a slam.

One of the main differences in the match came in the unforced errors department as Mladenovic committed 61 while Gavrilova contained hers to 30. The two were not unfamiliar with each other though, as they had faced off in the 2009 final of the French Open juniors, where Mladenovic was able to get the straight sets win. Gavrilova was able to get her revenge on Friday, and is able to continue her dream run in front of her home fans.

The Aussie winning the 171 minute match is a testament to her maturity and ability to keep her composure in difficult situations as she continues her best run at a slam. The 21 year old dubbed the win as the “best win of [her] whole career,” but has an opportunity to get an even better one as she will take on the No. 10 seed Carla Suarez Navarro in the fourth round.

Daria Gavrilova
Daria Gavrilova

Filed Under: Blogs, Featured Columns, Latest News, Lead Story, Live Coverage Tagged With: Australian Open, Daria Gavrilova, Kristina Mladenovic

Daria Gavrilova Pleases Home Aussie Crowd With Upset Of Petra Kvitova

January 20, 2016 by TennisGrandstand

by Kevin Craig

@Kcraig_tennis

Daria Gavrilova, the 21-year-old from Australia, gave the home crowd plenty to cheer for on Wednesday at Melbourne Park as she defeated the No. 6 seed and two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova.

Night matches in Margaret Court Arena are always a special event to watch, and having a home favorite playing a Grand Slam champion was no exception. Gavrilova is full of confidence currently after having teamed up with Nick Kyrgios to win the Hopman Cup in the first week of the year, and that confidence was on display as she got the biggest win of her career in the second round of the Australian Open.

In the beginning of the match, things appeared bleak to the Aussie crowd as Gavrilova fell down an early break in the first set to the big-hitting Kvitova. Gavrilova was undeterred, though, and fought back to win four of the next five games after being broken to win the set.

The second set started off fairly straightforward, with no breaks of serve coming until the sixth game, when Gavrilova was able to garner a break for a 4-2 lead. She would go on to attempt serving for the match at 5-3, but it was an unsuccessful attempt for the Aussie as Kvitova was able to fight back in that game and get back on serve. Gavrilova was able to keep her composure though and break right back to earn the 6-4, 6-4 victory.

Gavrilova took advantage of Kvitova’s poor serving performance, winning 52 percent of all of Kvitova’s serve points, including 57 percent on second serve. Combine that with 35 unforced errors from Kvitova, including four in the final game, and Gavrilova was well on her way to the upset.

There is a possibility that Kvitova was not 100 percent healthy, as she was forced to withdraw from both the events she was signed up for prior to the Australian Open.

The night before the upset occurred, Lleyton Hewitt somewhat foreshadowed what would happen, praising Gavrilova in his post-match press conference on Tuesday. Hewitt complimented her work ethic and claimed “she’s got a lot of good things ahead of her.”

Gavrilova will look to keep the Aussie dream alive as she takes on the No. 28 seed Kristina Mladenovic in the third round.

, the 21-year-old from Australia, gave the home crowd plenty to cheer for on Wednesday at Melbourne Park as she defeated the No. 6 seed and two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova.

Night matches in Margaret Court Arena are always a special event to watch, and having a home favorite playing a Grand Slam champion was no exception. Gavrilova is full of confidence currently after having teamed up with Nick Kyrgios to win the Hopman Cup in the first week of the year, and that confidence was on display as she got the biggest win of her career in the second round of the Australian Open.

In the beginning of the match, things appeared bleak to the Aussie crowd as Gavrilova fell down an early break in the first set to the big-hitting Kvitova. Gavrilova was undeterred, though, and fought back to win four of the next five games after being broken to win the set.

The second set started off fairly straightforward, with no breaks of serve coming until the sixth game, when Gavrilova was able to garner a break for a 4-2 lead. She would go on to attempt serving for the match at 5-3, but it was an unsuccessful attempt for the Aussie as Kvitova was able to fight back in that game and get back on serve. Gavrilova was able to keep her composure though and break right back to earn the 6-4, 6-4 victory.

Gavrilova took advantage of Kvitova’s poor serving performance, winning 52 percent of all of Kvitova’s serve points, including 57 percent on second serve. Combine that with 35 unforced errors from Kvitova, including four in the final game, and Gavrilova was well on her way to the upset.

There is a possibility that Kvitova was not 100 percent healthy, as she was forced to withdraw from both the events she was signed up for prior to the Australian Open.

The night before the upset occurred, Lleyton Hewitt somewhat foreshadowed what would happen, praising Gavrilova in his post-match press conference on Tuesday. Hewitt complimented her work ethic and claimed “she’s got a lot of good things ahead of her.”

Gavrilova will look to keep the Aussie dream alive as she takes on the No. 28 seed Kristina Mladenovic in the third round.

Daria Gavrilova
Daria Gavrilova

Filed Under: Archives, Blogs, Featured Columns, Latest News, Lead Story, Live Coverage Tagged With: Australian Open, Daria Gavrilova, Lleyton Hewitt, Petra Kvitova

The (re)Renaissance of Russian Women's Tennis

January 19, 2013 by Victoria Chiesa

Since Anastasia Myskina, Maria Sharapova and Svetlana Kuznetsova announced Russia’s arrival in women’s tennis in 2004 with their Grand Slam triumphs, the nation took a stranglehold on the WTA rankings. Serena Williams once joked that she should just be called “Williamsova” at the 2009 Wimbledon Championships, where the main draw contained 24 -ovas and seven -evas. “I just know the standard: everyone is from Russia,” she quipped. “Sometimes I think I’m from Russia, too. With all these new -ovas, I don’t know anyone, I don’t really recognize anyone.”

The height of Russian dominance came in 2008 with a sweep of Olympic medals and five players in the top 10.

At one point during 2008, Russians made up 50% of the world’s top 10, with Kuznetsova, Elena Dementieva, Dinara Safina, Vera Zvonareva and Anna Chakvetadze all occupying places in the elite. That came in the period when Sharapova was sidelined with a shoulder injury. They swept the podium at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, with Dementieva winning gold, Safina taking silver and Zvonareva winning bronze. However, in the 2012 year-end rankings, there were only four in the top 20, or 20%.
That led to the question: where have all the Russians gone? Dementieva’s retirement, coupled with injuries to Safina, Chakvetadze and Zvonareva, made many feel as though the days of Russian dominance on the WTA were over. Their mantle of churning out multiple quality WTA players all at once had now been taken up by nations such as Germany and the Czech Republic, and the longstanding tennis powerhouses of the United States and Great Britain have multiple young stars with bright futures.
The answer is: the Russians never really left, they were just taking a vacation.
With Sharapova, Kuznetsova, Maria Kirilenko, Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina all making the second week Down Under, it marks the first time that Russia has had more than two players reach the second week of a major event since the 2011 US Open.
Little needs to be said about Sharapova and Kuznetsova, arguably the two greatest Russians in terms of career accomplishments, who have six Grand Slam titles between them and 40 overall titles. Kuznetsova’s reascension has been particularly notable, as she missed almost half of 2012 due to a knee injury.
Maria Kirilenko is looking to match her best result at the Australian Open when she takes on Serena Williams in the fourth round.

Kirilenko, perhaps one of the hardest workers on the WTA, makes the most of what she has. In addition to being a standout doubles player, Kirilenko reached her career-high ranking in singles in 2012. She and countrywoman Nadia Petrova, who’s had a late-career renaissance in her own right, won the bronze medal in doubles at the Olympics; she finished fourth in singles, losing to Victoria Azarenka in the bronze medal match. Kirilenko’s had success Down Under before, as she reached the quarterfinals in 2010 after upsetting Sharapova in the first round; she’ll have an extremely tough test against Serena Williams.
Makarova has had her greatest successes in places called ‘bourne. The lefty stormed to the title at the WTA Premier event in Eastbourne as a qualifier in 2010, beating Flavia Pennetta, Nadia Petrova, Kuznetsova, Samantha Stosur and Azarenka in the final. She’s perhaps best known for her upset over Serena Williams at the Australian Open last year en route to the quarterfinals, and matched the feat this year by taking out Angelique Kerber. Her 11-5 record Down Under is her best mark out of all the majors. If the US Open was held in Bourne, Massachusetts, she’d probably win it.
Makarova and Vesnina are partnered in the Australian Open doubles event.

Vesnina, who reached the fourth round of the Australian Open in her Grand Slam debut in 2006, matched the feat this year. In her seventh career final to open the year in Hobart, she dethroned defending champion Mona Barthel to finally win a WTA title. She’s taken out two seeds this week, No. 21 Varvara Lepchenko and No. 16 Roberta Vinci.
In addition, Valeria Savinykh scored an upset win over Dominika Cibulkova in the second round and junior standout Daria Gavrilova qualified for her first Grand Slam main draw and had a second round showing.
As the old cliché goes, it’s always about “quality, not quantity.” As the Russians on the WTA have proved over the past decade, you can have both.

Filed Under: 2013 Australian Open Coverage, Lead Story, Victoria Chiesa Tagged With: Australian Open, career accomplishments, Daria Gavrilova, Ekaterina Makarova, Elena Vesnina, Maria Kirilenko, Maria Sharapova, russian tennis, Russian WTA tennis, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Valeria Savinykh

Wizards of Oz (IV): Tomic, Gasquet, Raonic, Kvitova, Wozniacki, And More on Day 4

January 16, 2013 by Chris Skelton

One hurdle remains before Tomic can arrange a second straight meeting with Federer here.

Leaving Federer vs. Davydenko for a special, detailed preview by one of our colleagues here, we break down some highlights from the latter half of second-round action on Day 4.
ATP:
Brands vs. Tomic (Rod Laver Arena):  A tall German who once caused a stir at Wimbledon, Brands has won four of his first five matches in 2013 with upsets over Chardy, Monfils, and Martin Klizan among them.  As sharp as Tomic looked in his opener, he cannot afford to get caught looking ahead to Federer in the next round.  Brands can match him bomb for bomb, so the last legitimate Aussie threat left needs to build an early lead that denies the underdog reason to hope.
Lu vs. Monfils (Hisense Arena):  Is La Monf finally back?  He somehow survived 16 double faults and numerous service breaks in a messy but entertaining four-set victory over Dolgopolov.  Perhaps facilitated by his opponent’s similar quirkiness, the vibrant imagination of Monfils surfaced again with shot-making that few other men can produce.  This match should produce an intriguing contrast of personalities and styles with the understated, technically solid Lu, who cannot outshine the Frenchman in flair but could outlast him by exploiting his unpredictable lapses.
Falla vs. Gasquet (Court 3):  The Colombian clay specialist has established himself as an occasional upset threat at non-clay majors, intriguingly, for he nearly toppled Federer in the first round of Wimbledon three years ago and bounced Fish from this tournament last year.  A strange world #10, Gasquet struggled initially in his first match against a similar clay specialist in Montanes.  He recorded a series of steady results at majors last year, benefiting in part from facing opponents less accomplished than Falla.  The strength-against-strength collision of his backhand against Falla’s lefty forehand should create some scintillating rallies as Gasquet seeks to extend his momentum from the Doha title two weeks ago.
Mayer vs. Berankis (Court 6):  While Berankis comfortably defeated the erratic Sergei Stakhovsky in his debut, Mayer rallied from a two-set abyss to fend off American wildcard Rhyne Williams after saving multiple match points.  He must recover quickly from that draining affair to silence the compact Latvian, who punches well above his size.  Sometimes touted as a key figure of the ATP’s next generation, Berankis has not plowed forward as impressively as others like Raonic and Harrison, so this unintimidating draw offers him an opportunity for a breakthrough.
Raonic vs. Rosol (Court 13):  The cherubic Canadian sprung onto the international scene when he reached the second week in Melbourne two years ago.  The lean Czech sprung onto the international scene when he stunned Nadal in the second round of Wimbledon last year.  Either outstanding or abysmal on any given day, Rosol delivered an ominous message simply by winning his first match.  For his part, Raonic looked far from ominous while narrowly avoiding a fifth set against a player outside the top 100.  He needs to win more efficiently in early rounds before becoming a genuine contender for major titles.
WTA:
Robson vs. Kvitova (RLA):  Finally starting to string together some solid results, the formerly unreliable Robson took a clear step forward by notching an upset over Clijsters in the second round of the US Open.  Having played not only on Arthur Ashe Stadium there but on Centre Court at the All England Club before, she often produces her finest tennis for the grandest stages.  If Robson will not lack for inspiration, Kvitova will continue to search for confidence.  She found just enough of her familiarly explosive weapons to navigate through an inconsistent three-setter against Schiavone, but she will have little hope of defending her semifinal points if she fails to raise her level significantly.  That said, Kvitova will appreciate playing at night rather than during the most scorching day of the week, for the heat has contributed to her struggles in Australia this month.
Peng vs. Kirilenko (Hisense):  A pair of women better known in singles than in doubles, they have collaborated on some tightly contested matches.  Among them was a Wimbledon three-setter last year, won by Kirilenko en route to the quarterfinals.  The “other Maria” has faltered a bit lately with six losses in ten matches before she dispatched Vania King here.  But Peng also has regressed since injuries ended her 2011 surge, so each of these two women looks to turn around her fortunes at the other’s expense.  The Russian’s all-court style and fine net play should offer a pleasant foil for Peng’s heavy serve and double-fisted groundstrokes, although the latter can find success in the forecourt as well.
Wozniacki vs. Vekic (Hisense):  Like Kvitova, Wozniacki seeks to build upon the few rays of optimism that emanated from a nearly unwatchable three-set opener.  Gifted that match by Lisicki’s avalanche of grisly errors, the former #1 could take advantage of the opportunity to settle into the tournament.  Wozniacki now faces the youngest player in either draw, who may catch her breath as she walks onto a show court at a major for the first time.  Or she may not, since the 16-year-old Donna Vekic crushed Hlavackova without a glimpse of nerves to start the tournament and will have nothing to lose here.
Hsieh vs. Kuznetsova (Margaret Court Arena):  A surprise quarterfinalist in Sydney, the two-time major champion defeated Goerges and Wozniacki after qualifying for that elite draw.  Kuznetsova rarely has produced her best tennis in Melbourne, outside a near-victory over Serena in 2009.  But the Sydney revival almost did not materialize at all when she floundered through a three-setter in the qualifying.  If that version of Kuznetsova shows up, the quietly steady Hsieh could present a capable foil.
Putintseva vs. Suarez Navarro (Court 7) / Gavrilova vs. Tsurenko (Court 8):  Two of the WTA’s most promising juniors, Putintseva and Gavrilova face women who delivered two of the draw’s most notable first-round surprises.  After Suarez Navarro dismissed world #7 Errani, Tsurenko halted the surge of Brisbane finalist Pavlyuchenkova in a tense three-setter.  Momentum thus carries all four of these women into matches likely to feature plenty of emotion despite the relatively low stakes.

Filed Under: Chris Skelton, Lead Story, Live Coverage Tagged With: alejandro falla, ATP, Australian Open, Bernard Tomic, Carla Suarez Navarro, Caroline Wozniacki, Daniel Brands, Daria Gavrilova, donna vekic, Florian Mayer, Gael Monfils, Hsieh Su-Wei, Laura Robson, Lesia Tsurenko, Lukas Rosol, Maria Kirilenko, melbourne, Milos Raonic, Peng Shuai, Petra Kvitova, ricardas berankis, Richard Gasquet, rod laver arena, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Tennis, WTA, Yen-Hsun Lu, yulia putintseva

Australian Open in Photos: Gavrilova, Coin, Konta

January 12, 2013 by TennisGrandstand

Our esteemed tennis photographer is currently at Melbourne Park and will be providing daily tennis galleries from the 2013 Australian Open. Make sure to check back each day for a new gallery and don’t miss the fun from down under!
January 12, 2013 — Our Tennis Grandstand photographer is back and today’s featured gallery includes Daria Gavrilova, Chanel Simmonds, Estrella Cabeza Candela, Julie Coin, and Johanna Konta.
[nggallery id=75]

Filed Under: Lead Story Tagged With: Australian Open, Chanel Simmonds, Daria Gavrilova, Estrella Cabeza Candela, Johanna Konta, Julie Coin, wta tennis photos

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