Anastasia Myskina reached the 4th round at Wimbledon with a straight sets, 6-3 6-4 win over Spaniard Anabel Medina Garrigues on Saturday. The Russian suffered from breathing problems throughout the whole match but still managed to play on a decent level. She will meet either Venus Williams or Jelena Jankovic next.
For the very first time at this year´s Wimbledon Nastya had a quite rough start into the match against Medina Garrigues when she got quickly broken. However Nastya fought back and managed not only to level the score but also ran away with consecutive games to take the first set 6-3 on her second setpoint when Medina Garrigues hit a forehand wide.
Nastya had problems hitting the forehand and did not appear as fast as in her last matches at SW19. She often tried to hit dangerous shots in an attempt to keep the rallies as short as possible. The trainer and a medical doctor were called at the end of set one for Nastya and yet again it seemed that the Russian was suffering from respiratory problems, something we have seen several times in the past, mainly at outside tourneys. There is no information about the specific problem yet, however the BBC commentators predicted it could be asthma or a hayfever attack since she got better after taking a inhaler but there are no confirmation yet. Maybe we get some news later the day.
It appeared that Medina Garrigues suffered as much as Nastya in the break as the Spaniard came back on court without any focuse. The Russian on the other side came out firing winners all over the place with a game that was similar to that one from the previous rounds. She broke the Spaniard to love and then won her service game without a loss of points again. Nastya continued to play awesome tennis leaving her opponent stunned with a 4-0 lead.
Medina Garrigues finally got an board when she converted her gamepoint. Nastya however was not bothered as she won her service game to go up 5-1. After missing out on two matchpoints on the Spaniard´s serve in the following game, the Russian started to struggle a bit. Serving for the match with new balls, Nastya got broken on the third breakpoint when Medina Garrigues hit a winning passing shot at the net. After that Medina Garrigues held serve and looked determined to level the score when Nastya started her second attempt to serve out for the match at 5-4.
Nastya managed to set up her third matchpoint by hitting a serve which could not be returned properly by the Spaniard. The Russian finally converted her chance when her opponent hit a forehand wide to win 6-3 6-4.
Venus Williams and Jelena Jankovic will meet later day. The winner is going to play Nastya in the fourth round.
Also playing later are Nastya and Elena Likhovtseva, they are meeting Carly Gullickson and Bryanna Stewart on Court 18.
