Upset City: Halep and Bouchard Bow Out at Wimbledon

June 30, 2015 | By Brian Coleman
Bouchard_Crop_01_1
Photo credit: Adam Wolfthal

The second day of Wimbledon saw two major players on the women’s side bounce out of the tournament, as third-seeded Romanian Simona Halep and 12th-seeded Canadian Eugenie Bouchard were both defeated on Tuesday at the All-England Club.

Halep was the first to go, defeated by 106th-ranked Jana Cepelova, who came back from a set down to beat her 5-7, 6-4, 6-3. The third-ranked Romanian was broke six times in the final two sets as Halep’s serve began to fail her.

Halep hit just three winners compared to 12 unforced errors in the deciding set and said after the match that she feels good physically but is emotionally exhausted.

“I wasn’t there. I couldn’t handle it very well,” said Halep. “She came back in a good way with her game. She was pushing me a lot. She was aggressive. But I can say that I let her come in and play aggressive. Actually, about my game, I have no bad things. I’m confident in my game. But emotional, and, like, inside power, it’s not there 100 percent.”

Cepelova will play another Romanian in the second-round, Monica Niculescu, who defeated Puerto Rico’s Monica Puig 5-7, 6-3, 6-1.

Halep’s  loss now opens up the bottom half of the women’s draw which contains the second-seeded defending champion Petra Kvitova. The Czech began her title defense with a 6-1, 6-0 victory over Kiki Bertens of the Netherlands, and will play Kurumi Nara next.

Bouchard’s 2015 woes might have reached their peak on Tuesday, as last year’s finalist at this Grand Slam was ousted in straight sets by China’s Ying-Ying Duan, 7-6(3), 6-4.

Duan edged Bouchard in a tie-breaker in the opening set and then nailed down the only break of the second set for the win.

Bouchard said she was playing with a slight tear in one of her abs.

“I felt very unprepared for this match,” Bouchard said. “I hadn’t practice that much. My timing was off … it’s not an excuse because I chose to play.”

Duan will meet Germany’s Tatjana Maria in the second round. Maria beat Bojana Jovanovski 7-6(2), 7-5.

Fifth-seeded Dane Caroline Wozniacki came out a little sluggish in her opener on Tuesday, but found her form for a 7-5, 6-0 win over China’s Saisai Zheng.

“It was a bit of a shaky start—it was tough to see with the sun coming down—and that didn’t help with the nerves,” said Wozniacki. “But I managed to fight for every point and in the end I played well. You just want to make a good start to Wimbledon, it’s always tricky in the first round, so I’m happy with how I turned it around and really stepped it up in the second set.”

Wozniacki will take on Czech Denisa Allertova next. Allertova beat her compatriot Katerina Siniakova 6-2, 4-6, 6-3.

Here are the rest of the women’s results from Tuesday:

►(8) Ekaterina Makarova d. Sachia Vickery 6-2, 6-4
►(10) Angelique Kerber d. Carina Witthoeft 6-0, 6-0
►(13) Agnieszka Radwanska d. Lucie Hradecka 6-3, 6-2
►(15) Timea Bacsinszky d. Julia Goerges 6-2, 7-5
►(17) Elina Svitolina d. Misaki Doi 3-6, 6-3, 6-2
►(18) Sabine Lisicki d. Jarmila Gajdosova 7-5, 6-4
►(20) Garbine Muguruza d. Varvara Lepchenko 6-4, 6-1
►(25) Alize Cornet d. Ana Konjuh 6-2, 6-2
►(26) Svetlana Kuznetsova d. Laura Siegemund 6-3, 6-4
►(28) Jelena Jankovic d. Elena Vesnina 6-4, 3-6, 10-8
►(31) Camila Giorgi d. Teliana Pereira 7-6(4), 6-3
►Mirjana Lucic-Baroni d. Yaroslava Shvedova 7-5, 6-7(5), 7-5
►Casey Dellacqua d. Tamira Paszek 6-2, 6-2
►Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova d. Mona Barthel 6-7(3), 7-6(4), 6-2
►Silvia Soler Espinosa d. Sesil Karatancheva 2-6, 6-2, 7-5
►Lara Arruabarrena-Vecino d. Pauline Parmentier 6-4, 6-2
►Christina McHale d. Johanna Larsson 6-3, 6-2
►Magdalena Rybarikova d. Karin Knapp 7-6(6), 3-0 (retired)


Brian Coleman
Senior Editor, Long Island Tennis Magazine
Brian Coleman is the Senior Editor for Long Island Tennis Magazine. He may be reached at brianc@usptennis.com.
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