Stosur advances despite German assault.

Australia’s last remaining hope in the Wimbledon women’s draw, Samantha Stosur advanced to the third round today after a tough three set battle against German teenager Tatiana Malak. Malak who defeated Australia’s other great hope Jelana Dokic in the first round, threatened to repeat the pain for Aussie tennis fans when she took the opening set from an error riddled Stosur.

Malak’s solid base line game proved difficult to match for the top ranked Australian who was clearly out of sorts in the first set. Stosur’s powerful forehand, so often her most dangerous weapon, proved highly erratic as multiple unforced errors gifted the young German the first break of serve. The trend continued throughout the opening set and the set finished as it had began with four consecutive Stosur errors handing the set to her 101st ranked opponent.

The second set followed a similar script to the opener as Stosur’s rapidly rising unforced error count threatened to derail her Wimbledon dream. After handing an early break to Malak, Stosur finally broke her opponents serve midway through the second set to provide hope that a comeback was imminent. Both players served solidly to send the second set to a tiebreaker.

Four more forehand errors to open the vital tiebreak appeared to have sealed Stosur’s fate as the rock solid Malak continued to frustrate the Australian. Stosur steadied to level the tiebreak at 6-6 and the turning point of the match came in the tiebreak’s marathon 13th point. Stosur toughed out an epic 31 shot rally to secure a set point which she duly converted to even up the match at one set all.

Despite finding form late in the second set Stosur’s forehand nightmare returned early in the deciding set allowing Malak to race to a 4-1 lead. It appeared Stosur’s 44 unforced errors would hand the German a second consecutive victory over Australia’s top ranked players. Just as the match appeared headed for another disappointing result for Australian tennis fans Stosur rallied, finally finding her ‘A’ game and reeling off five consecutive games to secure the match and advance to the third round.

It’s the first time Stosur has advanced past the second round at Wimbledon and looks set to face 13th seed Anna Ivanovic in the third round.

Samantha Stosur (Aus) 4 7 6
Tatiana Malak (Ger) 6 6 4