Serena, Sharapova restore order
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FOURTH seed Maria Sharapova rallied for a 4-6, 6-3, 6-1 second-round win over Spain’s Garbine Muguruza while Serena Williams destroyed former US Open champion Samantha Stosur of Australia as order and power was restored to the Rogers Cup in Montreal on Wednesday.
A day after the tournament was left without power and its main attraction when Canada’s Wimbledon finalist Eugenie Bouchard suffered a surprise opening-match loss, the event enjoyed a return to normalcy as the electricity was back on and Sharapova moved onto the third round.
World No. 1 Williams, just days after bagging her fourth title of the year at Stanford, then joined her with a 6-0, 6-2 thrashing of 2011 Flushing Meadows champion Stosur in just under an hour.
“It’s been a few weeks since I’ve been in that competitive atmosphere,” said Sharapova, who has not played since her fourth-round loss at Wimbledon. “It’s always quite different, no matter how much you train, you try to prepare for that. Once you step on the court, you feel a little bit more from the crowd, the energy. You get inspired by everything. But you’re ultimately a bit rusty.”
The French Open champion was far from sharp in her return as the promising young Spaniard took advantage of several errors by the Russian to grab the opening set. But Sharapova, a three-time winner this season, was able to convert on the big points to stay on track for a first title on the Canadian hardcourts.
Sixth seeded German Angelique Kerber, who has four runner-up finishes this season, had no trouble beating Frenchwoman Caroline Garcia 6-4, 6-1.
Kerber has had a solid start to her North American hardcourt campaign after reaching the final in Stanford last week but in four visits to Canada has never advanced past the third round.
In Toronto, top-ranked Novak Djokovic edged Gael Monfils 6-2, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (2) in the second round of the Rogers Cup.
After a lopsided tiebreaker, Djokovic fist-pumped and yelled at the end of the match that lasted 2 hours, 40 minutes.
Monfils pulled out all the stops by hitting a between-the-legs shot and throwing his racket to hit the ball, and each player tried to ignite the crowd to get louder.
“He’s probably the only guy in the world, tennis player, that I would pay a ticket to watch the match,” Djokovic said of Monfils. “He’s really fun to watch but not so much fun to play against.”
Eighth-seeded Andy Murray had little trouble winning his opener, defeating 19-year-old Nick Kyrgios 6-2, 6-2 in the first match of the day on center court.
“He outclassed me, he did everything better than me,” said Australian Kyrgios, who upset Rafael Nadal to reach the Wimbledon quarterfinals.
Home favorite Milos Raonic had his serve going amid some erratic shots as he came back to beat American Jack Sock 4-6, 7-6 (2), 7-6 (4) on center court.
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