Elena Rybakina advanced to the second round of Wimbledon

On the second day of Wimbledon in London, last year’s winner Yelena Rybakina from Kazakhstan played her first match. Having filed right through 12 times, the third racket of the world in three games coped with the American Shelby Rogers and confirmed her intention to compete again for the championship title.

For the reigning Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina, this season is going ambiguously. She has two prestigious titles in Indian Wells and Rome, finals at the Australian Open and Miami, as well as several failures due to injuries and other medical reasons. Therefore, before the start of Rybakina at Wimbledon, her fans were anxious. Having abandoned the fight after reaching the 1/16 finals of Roland Garros due to a viral infection superimposed on a chronic allergy in May, she tried to return three weeks later at the grass tournament in Berlin, but was defeated there in the second round by the Croatian Donna Vekic, and then, citing the need to recover to the end, she withdrew from the competition in Eastbourne, where she was “seeded” under the first number and already took a place at the very top of the grid.

According to Rybakina, in the process of preparing for Wimbledon, she did her best, although she would like to spend more time on the court. Her opponent for the first round was quite dangerous – American Shelby Rogers, who has two quarterfinals in Grand Slam tournaments to her credit, and won the most memorable victory in her career at the US Open 2021, defeating the then world ranking leader Australian Ashleigh Barty. Now the form of Rogers is far from optimal: she lost four previous matches in WTA tournaments. However, her rather powerful performance posed a threat to Rybakina, who, in the presence of Princess of Wales Catherine and Wimbledon guest of honor Roger Federer, who took seats in the first row of the royal box, had to again plunge into the exciting atmosphere of Center Court.

Due to the rain that charged in London in the middle of the day, the match was played under a roof.

The first set of Rybakina, who played with a tape on her right shoulder, frankly did not work out.

After leading 40:15 in the opening game, she unexpectedly gave up her serve and could not return it, even though Rodgers acted very limited tactically. For some reason, the American constantly served Rybakina diagonally into the first square, after which, as a rule, a very high-quality reception followed. But even these shortcomings in the game of the opponent did not help the third racket of the world to equalize the situation in the game. Everything changed at the beginning of the second set, when Rybakina finally stepped up her movement and fully put into action her main trump card – the serve.

Starting Wimbledon as the season’s leader in aces – 315 in 40 games – she added 12 more innings to that figure on Tuesday to finish the meeting with a score of 4-6, 6-1, 6-2.

Having closed the sick leave and passed a rather serious test of strength, the tennis star from Kazakhstan, it is possible, won her most difficult match this week. Since Rybakina is not expected to have particularly dangerous opponents before the 1/8 finals, she has the opportunity to significantly add to the decisive stages of the tournament.

Evgeny Fedyakov