Early Thursday at the 2022 Australian Open saw the first two eliminations of Top 10 WTA players, as third seed Garbine Muguruza fell to veteran Alize Cornet and sixth seed Anett Kontaveit got upset by Danish teenager Clara Tauson in the second round.
Playing in her 63rd Grand Slam and 17th Australian Open, France’s world No.61 Alize Cornet defeated two-time major champion Garbine Muguruza 6-3 6-3 to record the tenth Top 10 victory in her career.
Only in the aces/double faults aspect of the game was Muguruza slightly better than her opponent. In the number of winners they were equal, but Cornet made more than twice less unforced errors than her opponent, 16 to 33, and earned 12 break point opportunities (with 25% conversion rate), while the 2020 Aussie Open runner-up Muguruza earned none.
The 31-year-old Cornet has never been past the fourth round at a Grand Slam.
By the way, Cornet is one of rare players who publicly supported Novak Djokovic during his ordeal in Australia, as she posted on Twitter:
I know too little to judge the situation. What I know is that Novak is always the first one to stand for the players. But none of us stood for him. Be strong, Novak Djokovic.
You may remember that a few months ago we wrote “Clara Tauson has the whole package to be a Grand Slam winner”. The 19-year-old is now through to the third round of a major for the first time, as she stunned world No.7 Anett Kontaveit 6-2 6-4 on Thursday in Margaret Court Arena.
Former world No.1 junior Tauson is currently at a career-high No.39 WTA ranking. The young Dane needed just an hour and 19 minutes to claim her first Top 10 win against a player whose best Grand Slam showing was a quarterfinal appearance at the 2020 Australian Open.
Previously, Tauson was sponsored by Yonex tennis clothing. This season she became an Adidas representative and this fortnight she’s wearing their collection inspired by the Great Barrier Reef.
My favorite is out of the tournament (Muguruza), but give Alize credit as she was well prepared. Congratulations to Clara for taking out another favorite. I was watching both of these matches simultaneously, and they pretty much ended at the same time.