Status: 01/20/2022 08:16 a.m
Tennis pro Philipp Kohlschreiber clearly missed making it into the third round of the Australian Open. In the women’s category, co-favorite Garbine Muguruza surprisingly had to give up.
The 38-year-old veteran from Augsburg had no chance against the Spaniard Roberto Bautista Agut in 15th place on Thursday (January 20th, 2022) and lost in just 1:28 hours 1: 6, 0: 6, 3: 6. As in the previous year, Olympic champion Alexander Zverev is the only German in the third round of the individual competitions in Melbourne.
“Of course, Sascha is always the ray of hope that pulls everything out,” said Kohlschreiber, but also commented critically on the meager German balance sheet: “If you look at it realistically, it’s in the mass for the number of people who play tennis in Germany , bad. Extremely little follows. You just have to critically question why that is.”
“Just complete crap”
Kohlschreiber was far from entering the third round for the eighth time in his 16th participation at the Australian Open. The longtime Davis Cup player went into the match with a 3:2 record against Bautista Agut. But on Thursday he just ran behind from the start. “I’m very rarely speechless. But I can’t say what the problem was,” said Kohlschreiber: “It was just two left shoes today. I can’t explain why I didn’t have the timing. I can only defeat with one Smile. It was just complete crap today.”
Completely without a chance
Kohlschreiber delivered the first sentence in just 23 minutes, the second round lasted only five minutes longer. He couldn’t find a remedy against the highly concentrated and clever Spaniard, Kohlschreiber couldn’t exert any pressure with his serve and struggled a lot with the precision of his shots. The German was only able to put up more resistance in the third set, but with the break to 3:2 Bautista Agut finally set the course for victory.
A total of twelve German professionals competed in the individual competitions in Melbourne. For the women’s trio around Angelique Kerber it was even over in lap one. Zverev will fight against the qualifier Radu Albot (Moldova) on Friday for a place in the round of 16.
Muguruza fails early
The title dreams of two-time Grand Slam winner Garbine Muguruza have come to a surprisingly early end. The Spanish favorite and third in the world rankings lost 3:6, 3:6 against the unseeded French player Alize Cornet and was eliminated in the second round. In 2020 she had reached the final in Melbourne. Muguruza won the French Open in 2016 and Wimbledon a year later before falling far down the world rankings. Last year she returned to the top of the world, winning titles in Chicago and Dubai before the 28-year-old triumphed at the WTA Finals in Guadalajara in November.
Kontaveit out too
Estin Anett Kontaveit, who was in such good form recently, surprisingly missed the entry into the third round. The 26-year-old, who has moved up to seventh place in the world rankings with extremely strong performances in recent months, was beaten by 19-year-old Clara Tauson from Denmark 2: 6, 4: 6. World number two Aryna Sabalenka also had to fight hard. In the first set alone, the Belarusian made twelve double mistakes against the Chinese Wang Xinyu, but she prevailed 1:6, 6:4, 6:2 and advanced to the third round. Former French Open winner Iga Swiatek (Poland) is also there after beating Rebecca Peterson from Sweden 6-2, 6-2.
Source: sportschau.de