Tennis 29/08

[Anastazija]

Dechy - A.Bondarenko; (1.52) Pinnacle ---> 4/10

Dechy defenitely hasn't have best season so far. A lot of problems this year but still those defeats can't be rated as something negative. After all she usualy lose against well-known names. Maybe she is struggling a little bit and her game is not as good as it was last year but i do believe she can make a positive turn in following weeks. She won in doubles together with Zvonareva on US Open so she got a moral boost for future work and also indoor season is infront of her. She achieved some good results (indoors) last year, especially in Luxembourg where she went into SF. So today she has an opportunity to repeat that and i do believe she will try to do everything to achive it again.

Match against Petrova was a little bit easier to her especialy because Nadia was making a lot of UE and her big serve did fix troubles at all. French player was smartly using that and on the end she deserved to win. There was a moment in second set where i though Nadia is able to bounce back especially when she made a rebreak. But at result 3:3 (Nadia on serve) Dechy make some great returns on opponent 1st servis which was pretty rare moment till then. At that time she reminded me on her last year performances (in Luxembourg). Also she closed out this match pretty well. So in crucial moments she showed stability which was not her best side this year. So if she will be able to play on similar way as she did at the second part of second set than i do believe she will cause a lot of problems to Alona.

Alona is playing quite well lately. First she took Pierce out and than she was better against Srebotnik. Kata once again complicated too much and on the end she got what she wanted.

H2h:
2005 Wimbledon 32 Grass (O) N.DECHY 6-1 6-4