Bethanie Mattek-Sands, playing her first WTA singles match since the Australian Open, on Tuesday rallied to beat Venus Williams 6-7 (4/7), 6-3, 6-1 in the hard-court Silicon Valley Classic in San Jose, California.
Mattek-Sands, 34, notched her first singles match win in more than a year — since a first-round victory at last year’s French Open.
She dropped her serve to open the third set, but won the final six games to set up a second-round clash with Spain’s eighth-seeded Carla Suarez Navarro.
Photo: AP
“I’m in for another match, so I’m pumped,” said Mattek-Sands, who like seven-time Grand Slam champion Williams received a wild card into the draw.
Mattek-Sands was sidelined for more than a year after sustaining a ruptured tendon and dislocated kneecap at Wimbledon in 2017.
She returned to win the US Open mixed doubles title last year, but has been sidelined again this year by another knee injury.
“It’s been a tough couple of years,” Mattek-Sands said. “I’ve had a few surgeries — I feel like I’ve had 12 surgeries — but I’m feeling really good.”
Unable to capitalize in the first-set tiebreaker after clawing back from 4-2 down, she dominated the next two sets.
“I think I neutralized Venus’ serve a little bit,” Mattek-Sands said. “A lot of times she can get some free points on that first serve, so I stood back a little bit.”
In other first-round action, former world No. 1 Victoria Azarenka of Belarus overpowered French qualifier Harmony Tan 6-2, 6-4.
Azarenka converted seven of her 12 break point chances to line up a meeting with fifth-seeded Donna Vekic of Croatia, a 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 winner over Japan’s Misaki Doi.
In the doubles, Taiwan’s Liang En-shuo and China’s Zheng Saisai defeated China’s Zhang Shua and Romania’s Mihaela Buzarnescu 6-3, 1-6, 10-5 to advance to the quarter-finals.
CITI OPEN
Top-seeded Sloane Stephens was on Tuesday upset in the first round of the Citi Open and Coco Gauff also lost in the tune-up for the US Open.
Rebecca Peterson beat Stephens 6-2, 7-5 at the hard-court tournament in Washington. Stephens was coming off a third-round loss at Wimbledon.
Gauff, the 15-year-old who reached the fourth round at Wimbledon and got into the Citi Open as a qualifier, lost 6-4, 6-2 to Zarina Diyas.
Stephens is ranked eighth and Peterson is 70th in the world.
Stephens won the Citi Open in 2015 and reached the 2017 doubles final.
Peterson, from Sweden, is next to face Italian Camila Giorgi in the second round. Giorgi posted a 6-2, 7-5 win over Sachia Vickery of the US.
Meanwhile, eighth-seeded Monica Puig of Puerto Rico defeated American Allie Kiick 6-4, 6-2.
Taiwanese fourth seed Hsieh Su-wei defeated Belgium’s Kirsten Flipkens 6-4, 6-3 to advance to the round of 16.
In the women’s doubles, Hsieh and Chinese partner You Xiaodi defeated Russia’s Anna Blinkova and the Czech Republic’s Katerina Siniakova 2-6, 6-2, 10-8 to advance to the quarter-finals.
In the men’s draw, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga outlasted second-seeded Karen Khachanov for a 6-4, 2-6, 7-5 victory.
Daniil Medvedev, Marin Cilic, Frances Tiafoe and Kyle Edmund also advanced.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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