Ankita Raina beats former world no 12 Sabine Lisicki in Surbiton
India women’s tennis No.1 Ankita Raina showed a brilliant display against the explosive Sabine Lisicki, who was a former World No.12 and a Wimbledon finalist. However, what made the job way trickier was that it was her second match of the day after she overcame France’s Myrtille Goerges.
The organizers of the W100 ITF event in England had scheduled things in a way that the winners of the opening round of qualifiers would have to play a second match on the same day. Consequently, after Raina overcame Goerges 7-6 (8-6), 6-1 in straight sets, she had a tougher task against a more complicated opponent in Lisicki.
However, the 26-year-old was coming into the game at the back of some good form. She has just beaten 2011 US Open champion Samantha Stosur just over a month back and has looked increasingly consistent enough to break into the top 100.
And it was no surprise that she managed to beat the big German 6-3, 6-1 just hours after playing her first match on grass for the season. “The main change was in Ankita’s second serve. Normally her second serve is slow because she looks for placement. But now she was switching the speed and going for more angles. That way Sabine couldn’t anticipate what was coming,” said her coach Hemant Bendrey, reported Indian Express.
The win against Lisicki has come at the back of some decent results in the past few months as before the win over Stosur, Raina had also reached the final of a W60 ITF event in Turkey. The upward going bar in her rankings saw her reach career-best spot of 164 as she had got into the qualifiers of the French Open although she lost in the opening round to American Cori Gauff.
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