Angelique Kerber has managed the revenge of Stuttgart: The two-time Grand Slam winner defeated the world ranking tenth Petra Kvitova in her opening match 6:3, 6:2 and is in the round of 16. Three days earlier, Kerber had clearly lost his duel with the Czech in the Fed Cup semi-final (2:6, 2:6). In the round of the last 16, the Kieler will face Latvia’s Anett Kontaveit on Thursday, who eliminated last year’s finalist Kristina Mladenovic (France).
By Ulrike Weinrich from Stuttgart
After 1:17 hours Kerber turned her third match point and showed the winner’s fist. Her grandmother Maria, who had come from Poland, was also happy in her box. After the two Fed Cup defeats against Kvitova and Karolina Pliskova this weekend, Kerber celebrated their first victory in this year’s clay court season.
“It wasn’t an easy match for me, but I just walked out and tried to take the energy of the audience with me,” Kerber said: “The first laps are always the hardest for me. So I’m all the happier that the first hurdle has been cleared.”
Next Monday, she will replace Julia Görges as Germany’s number one. The woman from Regensburg surprisingly failed in the first round against the qualifier Marketa Vondrousova from the Czech Republic (2:6, 2:6) on Tuesday.
The 30-year-old won the Hallensandplatz tournament in the Swabian metropolis in 2015 and 2016 twice in a row, this time endowed with 816,000 dollars. Nevertheless, immediately before the start of her ash season, she had kept her goals small. “I’m sure sand isn’t my favorite surface. I’m not under too much pressure and I don’t have high expectations,” said Angie, but announced: “I accept the challenge and think things will improve from match to match.
Kerber started the second left-handed duel with Kvitova within four days a little nervous. In their first service game, the twelfth in the world rankings made two double mistakes, but still managed to get their serve through. Kvitova did not seem as stable as at the weekend and made some slight mistakes.
At Kerber’s first break, the two-time Wimbledon winner failed when she hit a backhand far out. Kerber showed his fist for the first time and pushed himself. With one of her irresistible forehand longline winners, she won her first set after half an hour. Kvitova’s forehand sailed out at the next rally – and the Porsche Arena, which sold out with 4500 spectators, really shook for the first time that day.
Kerber became more and more confident in the baseline duels and shows a significantly improved body language. At 2:1, the increasingly tired Czech woman broke again – it was a preliminary decision, because the favourite of the audience could hardly allow and convince herself of any weaknesses afterwards.
The 2016 US Open winner had always reached at least the quarter-finals in her six tournament appearances so far in 2018 – she had won the event in Sydney at the beginning of the year – and only narrowly missed the final shortly afterwards at the Australian Open.
Their coach Wim Fissette was very positive about the clay court season. “This is an important time. I firmly believe that Sand can make Angie a better player. Because she has to train certain things there that she also needs on grass and hard court – and that makes her play better there,” said the Belgian.
However, Fissette had admitted that ash was the “most difficult” coating for his protégé. “That’s clear, which is why our expectations are not as high as on hard courts or lawns,” emphasized the 38-year-old and added: “Of course, she loves playing on grass and immediately feels the confidence. In the last few years she has also lacked a bit of the power to be successful on heavy clay courts.”
Fissette emphasized that Kerbers motivation was also on the unloved ashes at “100 percent”. “But of course she has such good experiences on grass – and also on hard court. On clay, however, these really good experiences are missing, especially at the tournaments in Rome, Madrid and the French Open,” he said.
When Kerber came to Melbourne this year and saw the Centre Court, “all the memories of her Grand Slam victory came back in 2016,” Fissette reported: “If she comes to Paris now, then she doesn’t have these positive memories – yet. Maybe Angie’ll get those memories this year.”