No. 5 seed Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia pushed past American Danielle Collins 7-5, 1-6, 7-5 in two hours and 18 minutes in the first round of the Mubadala Abu Dhabi Open on Monday.
Collins racked up an 11-6 edge in aces and saved nine of 13 break points in her winning 16 of the 31 games played. It didn’t matter, as Ostapenko fell behind 5-4 in the third set before winning eight of the next nine points to move ahead 6-5 and winning her first attempt at match point.
It was a similar story for No. 7 seed Anett Kontaveit of Estonia, who rallied to beat China’s Shuai Zhang 4-6, 7-6 (4), 6-4 in a tilt between the 18th- and 23rd-ranked players in the world. Kontaveit smashed 10 aces and saved 10 of 13 break points.
Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk battled past Sorana Cirstea of Romania 6-2, 1-6, 6-2. Belgium’s Elise Mertens handled business against Italy’s Martina Trevisan 6-0, 6-2.
Upper Austria Ladies Linz
Germany’s Jule Niemeier stormed back to beat Sofia Kenin 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 in the only Round of 32 singles match of the day in Linz, Austria.
While Kenin saved seven of nine break points, Niemeier held a 5-2 advantage in aces and won 38 of 50 first-service points (76 percent) to complete the comeback.
Eleven matches in the singles draw are scheduled to be played Tuesday, including No. 1 seed Maria Sakkari of Greece facing off with Nuria Parrizas Diaz of Spain.
–Field Level Media