On a day when the Australian Open champion, Li Na, followed the men’s title-holder Stanislas Wawrinka out of the French Open in the first round – along with Grigor Dimitrov – Heather Watson was happy to stand firm in the middle of the gathering mayhem.
The British No2, back in the top 100 and looking reborn, hit the Czech Barbora Zahlavova-Strycova off the court, taming a stiff, chilly breeze to win her first-round match 6-3, 6-4 and provided evidence that her game has gone to another level.
Li Na, the No2 seed who won here in 2011 and added the Australian title this year, collapsed in the face of an inspired performance by France’s 103-ranked Kristina Mladenovic, who won 7-5, 3-6, 6-1. That is a shock to outdo even Wawrinka’s straight-sets exit the previous night, against the Spanish clay-courter Guillermo García-Lopez. This is the first time that both Australian Open champions have been knocked out in the first round at Roland Garros.
In the aptly named Bull Ring on Tuesday, Ivo Karlovic, the tallest man in tennis at 6ft 10in and one of a record 38 over-30s players in the men’s draw, reduced the game’s young darling Dimitrov, to mortal proportions. The Croatian bamboozled the No11 seed with his serve to win 6-4, 7-5, 7-6 (4).
Watson’s tournament, meanwhile, now gets serious. Her next assignment is against the form contender of the season, Simona Halep. The world No4, who extended Maria Sharapova in the Madrid final, is going to be hard to stop in this tournament and she cruised into the second round by dismissing the Russian Alisa Kleybanova for the loss of just two games in less than an hour in a sparsely populated Court Philippe Chatrier.
The new-look Watson, committed to taking every chance that comes her way rather than rely in the grind of defence, threatened to overpower Strycova in a whirlwind start, but was delayed mid-set when her racquet touched the net as she put the ball away for what would have been a 4-1 lead inside a quarter of an hour. As it happens the umpire spotted it and, two double-faults later, Watson had surrendered her break lead.
After wrapping up the set, she broke again at the start of the third before losing concentration to drop serve in the third game and what had once seemed a straightforward match became a bit of a tense struggle. Watson stuck at it, though, and put it to bed on her third match point with another forehand to the backhand corner that was too big for the Czech, ranked 63 in the world.
If she can do this to a player only 30 or so points ahead of her she will have a much better season than in 2013, when injury and illness cut her down and brought a serial scowl to her normally happy countenance.
She will not balk at the challenge of playing Halep, having given her a serious fright at the US Open last year. Halep remembers it well. “I could not forget,” the Romanian said, “because I played around three hours and 30 minutes. She was very strong and it was a difficult match. But here it is on clay, so it will be different. Another day, another match.”
