The Hindu : Sport : Koryttseva gives King a thorough mauling

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Sep 21, 2007
ePaper

Sport

Sport

Koryttseva gives King a thorough mauling

Vijay Parthasarathy

— PHOTO: AFP

EASY WIN: Daniela Hantuchova advanced after overpowering Anastasia Rodionova in the second round.

Kolkata: There wasn’t much that Vania King, first-round conqueror of Marion Bartoli, could throw at Mariya Koryttseva at the Sunfeast Open on Thursday. The Ukrainian, ranked 164 in the world and nearly 80 spots below her opponent, was in the zone, tempering aggressive shotmaking with accuracy and yanking her opponent from side to side, without once letting up through the match.

The 6-1, 6-2 result was a step further than comprehensive, it was a mauling. At the risk of making a silly analogy — even if this wasn’t a display of the “kitchen sink-bathtub” kind of big-hitting that Andy Roddick memorably alluded to, after one of his Wimbledon defeats against Roger Federer, this match was scripted along similar lines.

Evidently, Koryttseva’s general plan was to attack King’s backhand and blast any resistance. Both Koryttseva and King are power players, not especially sensitive to variation, and something had to give: as it happened, Koryttseva’s game held, King’s disintegrated.

An unfortunate reversal for someone who should have capitalised on her rout of the top-seed, but King was never allowed to settle.

King held serve at the start of the match, and not again for another 10 games. It wasn’t as if she served poorly: she landed a high proportion of her first serves, but however wide she served, her opponent managed to keep the ball in play with deep returns at full stretch, and King was forced on the backfoot. Every King service game went to deuce, and her opponent converted on seven out of 12 break points.

Tactical error

King should have tried harder to slow down the pace, instead she kept playing to her opponent’s strengths. Everything that the Ukrainian tried seemed to come off: the whippy inside-out forehand on break point, that two-fisted backhand pass maliciously close to the line, the lob struck with the ball having landed behind her head. It was one of those days. Koryttseva has struggled with injury for a year; surgery performed belatedly (because she wanted to put it off for as long as possible) left her in a cast for a month.

“I practised with Vania on Tuesday, played some points, and the only thing I was worried about was my fitness, but luckily that worked out,” she said at the post-match press conference.

Meanwhile, Daniela Hantuchova and Flavia Pennetta moved into the quarterfinals with facile victories.

The results: Singles: Second round: Flavia Pennetta bt Akgul Amanmuradova 6-1, 6-3; Mariya Koryttseva bt Vania King 6-1, 6-2; Daniela Hantuchova bt Anastasia Rodionova 6-2, 6-1; Anne Keothavong bt Sunitha Rao 6-3, 6-2.

Doubles: Ipek Senoglu & Yaraslova Shvedova bt Sandy Gumulya & Whitney Jones 6-2, 7-6(3).

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail