No.1 seed Ayumi Morita lived up to her billing on the first day of the Taipei Ladies Open yesterday by sweeping aside Carly Gullickson 6-0, 6-2. The Japanese took top billing after the late withdrawal of China’s Peng Shuai and showed she was now the player to beat by outclassing her American opponent.
Things started badly for Gullickson when she was broken in the first game before Morita raced through the rest of the set, claiming the last two games without dropping a point.
The US player avoided the possibility of an ignominious “double bagel” by holding her serve in the first game of the second set, but after handing the third game to Morita with a double fault the writing was on the wall for the 22 year-old.
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
Gullickson faced match point in the seventh game, but hung on only for Morita to wrap things up on the next match point in the subsequent game.
The Japanese world No. 74 faces Katalin Marosi in the next round after the Hungarian beat Anne Kremer of Luxembourg 6-4, 6-3.
Australia’s Sophie Ferguson brought no. 6 seed Michelle Larcher de Brito’s hopes to an early end in a one-sided contest on Court 2. The 23 year-old from Sydney benefitted from a flurry of errors by her frustrated Portuguese opponent to take the first set 6-1.
The 16 year-old started the second set no better and found herself 0-2 down after being broken in the second game. Ferguson immediately dropped her serve and the match became more of a contest as Larcher de Brito showed signs of the talent that has seen her labelled as a potential star of the future.
The Portuguese had two break points at 4-4 but failed to convert either and paid the price when Ferguson claimed her third match point in the next game.
Next up for the Aussie is Japan’s Yurika Sema who beat Aniko Kapros of Hungary 6-4, 6-1.
In the doubles, third seeds Andrea Hlavackova of the Czech Republic and Andreja Klepac of Slovenia defeated Taiwan’s Chen Yi and Rika Fujiwara of Japan 6-7 (7), 7-6 (3) [10-6]. In yesterday’s other doubles match second seeds Chan Chin-wei of Taiwan and Yan Zi of China beat Liu Chi-fan of Taiwan and Liu Shaozao of China 6-2, 6-2.
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