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The organizers of the National Bank Open women’s tennis championships breathed a sigh of relief Monday night after getting most of the opening day’s matches into the books despite three rain delays.
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Only one centre court match was completed during the soggy afternoon session but the final showers of the day held off until the two evening matches were completed.
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For the fans who braved the iffy weather, there was a measure of disappointment because two crowd favourites lost.
Veteran Venus Williams dropped a 6-2, 7-5 decision to 13th-seeded Madison Keys and Rebecca Marino of Vancouver, lost to Britain’s Katie Boulter,
Marino noted that, while Boulter had to qualify for the main draw, that might have given her an advantge because she had two matches to become accustomed to the court. And Marino said she might have hurt her chances with inconsistent serving,
“I looked at those stats and I wasn’t happy,” said Marino.
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But she pointed out Boulter is on the rise after winning her first WTA title earlier this year on the grass at Nottingham.
American Jennifer Brady, who won a WTA Tour match for the first time in nearly two years last week in Washington, battled her way to a 7-6(7), 0-6, 7-6(8) victory over Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia.
Brady, who has been ranked as high as No. 13, entered the tournament on a protected ranking.
Brady appeared to be at the top of her game when she reached the finals of the 2020 U.S. Open and the 2021 Australian Open. But things took a turn for the worse when she felt a pop in her heel while playing against Ostapenko in the WTA 1000 later that year.
That pop ended up being a torn plantar fascia, and that, combined with a stress fracture in her right knee suffered shortly after, kept the 28-year-old Brady out of action for 698 days.
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“I have no idea how I won that match,” Brady said. “On the court I don’t feel like I’m moving as good as I want to, I’m not hitting the ball as deep or heavy as I want to. I’m not playing good tennis, I’m just playing tennis. That’s how I feel on court.”
“I knew (the last match against Ostapenko) was the last match I played before I was injured and I was really looking forward to (the rematch), said Brady. “I wish I could have played a better match, but who cares. People only look at the result, so I’m happy that I somehow won this match.”
Brady came back from a 4-2 deficit in the first set and was down. 3-0 in the third.
Brady said her goal at that point was to win a simgle game.
“I don’t want to lose 0 and 0,” Brady said. “It’s embarrassing. I just wanted to get off the court. I don’t want to be here at all. But then she gave me a little bit of an opening, a few unforced errors. Then in the tiebreak, same thing as the first set. Just tried to stay in there.”
American Sloane Stephens defeafed Anhelina Kalinina of Ukraine 6-4, 7-6.
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