Second round action at the 2015 Toray Pan Pacific Open kicked off on Wednesday and the big-name players continue to make almost flawless progress in Tokyo’s Ariake Coliseum.
Angelique Kerber was among the stars who made her way into the tournament’s round of the last eight in Japan today. The German dropped the first set against American Madison Brengle, but that was little more than a freak accident for the reigning Porsche Tennis Grand Prix champion as Kerber gave Brengle just one game in the next two sets, hitting 54 winners in the process.
Following her impressive 43-minute double bagel beatdown of Yi-Fan Xu yesterday, Belinda Bencic had a bigger mountain to climb on Wednesday, facing Australia’s Samantha Stosur in the second round. The 2011 US Open champion took the first set, but Bencic wasn’t nearly ready to give up, rallying back to force the decider that ultimately ended in her favor. The Swiss world #15 will be meeting Garbine Muguruza in the quarterfinals, as the young Spaniard won her first match against BarboraStrycova under the watchful eyes of her new coach Sam Sumyk.
Wednesday also marked the start of Caroline Wozniacki’s Toray Pan Pacific Open campaign, as the tournament’s top seed played her first match against Croatia’s Ana Konjuh. The 17-year-old rising star made her way through the qualifying stages, but the Dane sent Konjuh off the court in straight sets in the second round.
The second round will complete inside the Ariake Coliseum on Thursday and fans can look forward to seeing Karolina Pliskova & Ana Ivanovic in action in Tokyo for the first time this year! For all this and more, keep checking back to Women’s Tennis Blog for all the latest from Tokyo!
Sumyk working with Muguruza now? He’s done well with Azarenka but failed with Bouchard. Interesting to see his partnership with this young gun.