Elise Mertens is back in the fourth round of Wimbledon after an impressive win against No.14 seed Elina Svitolina.
The 29-year-old had lost both previous meetings against Svitolina on grass – most recently falling to the Ukrainian at the Bad Homburg tournament in Germany in the lead-in to this year's Championships.
But Mertens didn’t appear to have any scar tissue from that defeat or the one two years ago at Wimbledon, and came into The Championships having lifted the trophy in ’s-Hertogenbosch last month.
She sprinted out of the gates on No.1 Court on Friday, taking the first set 6-1 in just 26 minutes.
Svitolina was having trouble landing first serves and that almost always spells trouble against No.24 seed Mertens.
The Belgian doesn’t often try to blast winners off the return but cleverly puts the ball into difficult spots. She ended up breaking her opponent three times in the opener.
“Sometimes it just comes together and today was that kind of day,” she said.
“I had doubles yesterday and I just felt my returns pretty well and I said let’s take that into the match. I was enjoying my game and was enjoying playing on court one. It’s not that you get to play on court one every day.”
As expected, the higher-ranked Svitolina made it much more competitive in the second set; she broke the Mertens serve immediately. However, the Belgian countered and it was nip and tuck for the rest of the set with plenty of break point chances for both.
In the end a tie-break was needed and Svitolina raced into a 3-0 lead.
“I was getting very tight at the end," Mertens recounted. "But on the other hand I knew that she had to win the set to stay in the match and that’s what I was trying to tell myself, that if I’m doing my things and I’m doing them well then I won’t regret anything.”
The No.1 Court crowd were probably expecting a third set at that point but Mertens had other plans. She trusted her game plan and continued to use the variety that had worked well to get her into a winning position.
Sometimes it just comes together and today was that kind of day.
“She’s a very steady player so I tried to move her around a little bit more,” Mertens said.
“If you give her three shots the same for her it’s very easy. So I was trying to put some pressure on her second serve and I felt that she was feeling that especially in the tie-break.”
Slowly but surely Mertens clawed her way back and clinched the win on the first of two match points to beat Svitolina for the first time on this surface.
She is hungry for more, with her next goal a first Wimbledon quarter-final, although she will first have to get past No.1 seed Aryna Sabalenka in the fourth round.
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