After seeing the two first seeds go out, you kind of feel like ‘I can do this too’. I grew up with these girls that are beating them.
That was the thought that stuck in Ajla Tomljanovic‘s head when she stepped on Court Philippe Chatrier at Roland Garros to face third seed Agnieszka Radwanska. Motivated by 20-year-old Garbine Muguruza’s historic victory over Serena Williams and 21-year-old Kristina Mladenovic’s triumph over Li Na, the Croatian world No. 72 Tomljanovic, born in 1993 just like her two previously mentioned colleagues, raced to a 5-1 lead against Radwanska and by converting three of her four break opportunities recorded a 6-4 6-4 third-round victory in an hour and 21 minutes.
Radwanska had an interesting quote of her own:
It doesn’t mean if the first and second seeds lost, it doesn’t mean the third one is going to win.
Tomljanovic had never been past the second round of a Grand Slam, but we sure can count on her to make it big. Actually here at Women’s Tennis Blog we mentioned her back in 2007 as a possible future tennis star. She comes from a successful sporting family – her father Ratko was the captain of the Croatian national handball team when they won the Olympic gold medal in Atlanta. (source: BBC, photo: Jimmie48)
Agnieszka Radwanska much like Serena her game just wasn’t there and like Garbiñe Ajla just played her game not made mistake to give the veteran player chance to get themselves back in the game.