Agnieszka Radwanska made the third round for a fifth time at the US Open. A game full of effort and skill gave her a straight sets win over Magda Linette 6-3, 6-2 on Court 17 at the Billy Jean King National Tennis Center Wednesday afternoon.
After the defeat of Urszula Radwanska, Linette got her chance to play the better of the two in the Round of 64. She never played against the 15th seed before and should expect to have a much harder time scoring points against a player who is consistent on ending matches quickly. With her victory over Katerina Siniakova Monday that ended in under an hour, the high ranked Pole would more than likely succeed at moving on with a set of swift shots on serve and strong response on the return.
Radwanska got the set up to her speed setting the shots against her opponent where unforced errors and winners were the key to her 3-0 lead early on. Linette began to feel the early signs of trouble cascading down as her forehand started short on the serve unable to get a good rally going between here and Radwanska. It worked out in the fourth down 0-40 where she made a nine shot rally end with a shot away from Radwanska preventing the triple break.
Despite her efforts to play for the win, the top seeded Polish star captured the victory for herself taking another notch to her score. Linette made her best chance for victory in the fifth where she pushed deuce on Radwanska who was serving for a third time in the set. Gain the advantage, a shot on the return went off the top of the net and happily dropped into her opponent’s court preventing the sweep. She served hard against her fellow countrywoman forcing deuce at key point where she won it on an unforced error that put just two games between one another.
The margin grew to three for Radwanska as Linette put too much aggression on her returns that killed her chance at being consistent. With Radwanska playing for the set, Linette brought her game together at the critical moment to win against her. She was up 40-15 but a shot went long on two occasions that pushed the game to deuce.
Though she gained another off Radwanska her efforts weren’t enough to make a charge at tying things up. In the end on 40-30, Radwanska shut her down ending the set in 39 minutes. Despite serving at 59 percent she won points on 10 of 14 along with a solid second serve that helped her in her quest to stay ahead.
Linette took the first game of the second set making every attempt to be a strong challenger against Radwanska. Unfortunately that didn’t go as planned as the Pole made her march back to even up after two games. Linette didn’t allow her easy victories deeper into the second but as they went by it was becoming clear that the chances of another comeback like the first wasn’t going to occur.
On a 5-1 score in the set, Radwanska had a triple match point but the fight from Linette caused the Pole to play for it on deuce or wait another moment to end her opponent. Unforced errors caused Radwanska to try in the seventh but it ended instead during the eighth where she won on the double match point holding serve.
It was finished in 84 minutes where Radwanska breathed a sigh of relief as her defeat of Linette looked easy on the scoreboard but difficult on court. She made just 15 winners against her Polish opponent making seven unforced errors throughout. The service percentage dwindled but the points held up strong in the end.
The victory moved Radwanska into the third round where she would see action against a stronger opponent in American Madison Keys Friday.
