Tiebreaks remain the attraction for Tereza Martincova in Ostrava. The Czech wildcard secured a place in their sixth quarter-finals of the season with a 7-6 (5), 7-6 (6) win over the 5th placed French Open finalist Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova at the J&T Banka Ostrava Open .
Martincova had sealed the victory in 2 hours and 19 minutes and could have finished the game much earlier if she turned one of the two match points that she held 7: 6, 5: 1 when the Russian served, or the game with one of the both would have ended their three opportunities to do so in the second sentence.
Martincova sealed the third top 20 victory of her career with one win and, after finishing second in Prague, moves into the second quarter-finals on home soil this season.
Art of the comeback: After saving a match ball in a more than three-hour win over compatriot Katerina Siniakova in the opening round, which ended 9: 7 in the tiebreaker final, Martincova also came back early when she won the second round.
Pavlyuchenkova was the first to break the serve with 3: 3 and in the 10th game took the lead with one set, but never reached the target value. She was two points away from the set with 5-4, 30-15, but lost four points in a row.
The Czech’s dynamism lasted well into the second set: she lost only eight points in the first six games – three of them in a two-man game in which she saved two breakpoints to consolidate to 2-0 – by one point to provide from the win at 7-6, 5-1.
From then on, however, things got complicated: Pavlyuchenkova saved two match points to hold the service and forced Martincova to serve, which she failed three times. Martincova never reached the match point again in her service games, losing four games in a row and being broken again when she served a third time for the game 6-5.
Martincova’s 4-1 lead in the tie-break also fizzled out when Pavlyuchenkova equalized to 4-4, 5-5 and 6-6 and thus saved a third match point before the Czech finally sat over the line.
Next: Martincova will next meet the number 4 seeded Maria Sakkari from Greece, who ousted Luxembourg’s runner-up Jelena Ostapenko in straight sentences earlier on Thursday.
Bencic rolls past Sorribes Tormo on debut in Ostrava
The Tokyo Olympic gold medalist, who made her debut at the WTA 500, took just 88 minutes to claim victory and her 15th win in her last 18 games.
Bencic played against Sorribes Tormo for the first time, breaking serve six times and winning eight straight games 2-2 in the first set to take over the game.
Sorribes Tormo, quarter-finalist in Ostrava a year ago, where she led the eventual champion Aryna Sabalenka 6-0, 4-0 before the defeat, did not want to go quietly: The number 36 in the world saved a breakpoint to get into the Board in the next game and get a breakback, but no more time to make her own comeback.
“I think I prepared very well tactically and mentally for this game because it’s very tough,” said Bencic after the game. “You often have to win the point against them, especially on this surface where it’s very slow. I’m glad I stayed disciplined throughout the game.”
Statistics of the game: The Swiss almost tripled Sorribes Tormo’s winnings in the game while managing to play with controlled aggression. Having 31 winners with only 16 non-enforced errors in the competition, Bencic showed that they were excited about the successful execution of their game plan.
“She’s a great player, she makes you play worse and she lets you make mistakes,” added Bencic. “It was important to always get into the rally and not do 1, 2, kind of rallies because it’s almost impossible with her. I’m happy how I did it.”
She also converted six of the nine breakpoints she created.
The winner was rounded off on Thursday by Bencic’s compatriot Jil Teichmann, who defeated the American Alison Riske in three sets 6-3, 1-6, 6-4, to a meeting with the left-hander and number 2 seed Petra Kvitova in the last eight.
