Monday 8th October 2007

Casey Does It Again
by Barry Wood

Australia's Casey Dellacqua claimed her second win in two weeks against Severine Bremond when she defeated the French woman 6-2 6-4 during the opening day's play at the PTT Bangkok Open.

The victory continued a great season for the left-hander, who has earned over 50 wins this season. Earlier this year she won three consecutive ITF tournaments in Australia, and then followed up with runs to the final in tournaments as far apart as Spain and Japan.

Next came a semi-final at the pre-Wimbledon tournament at Surbiton, and after winning a Sony Ericsson WTA Tour match at Birmingham she qualified for Wimbledon, only to run into compatriot Nicole Pratt. Since then, Casey has excelled at several other tournaments, winning yet another title in New York in August.

The match began badly for Bremond as she dropped her serve in the opening game, and although she pulled level at 2-2 the feisty Dellacqua swept the next four games for the loss of just four points to take the set.

Bremond responded by breaking to take a 3-1 lead in the second set, but dropped her own serve in the next game. Then in a strong finish, Delleacqua won the final 12 points.

"Today I felt pretty good out there," said Dellacqua. "I played her first round last week in Tokyo so I knew her game pretty well. It was pretty good and I was happy to get the win. I think I served really well. I used my lefty well and played into her backhand a lot and got the balls that I needed. And I felt really confident out there, beating her last week as well. So it was a good match."

Canada's Aleksandra Wosniak was another winner, beating Ioana Raluca Olaru of Romania 7-5 6-4, and Urszula Radwanska, who is from Poland, beat Sorana Cirstea, from Romania. 6-0 6-3. Not a good day for Romania. Or for Jelena Kostanic Tosic, who retired with a back injury after losing the first set to Camille Pin 7-5.

You'd like to know who qualified, wouldn't you, so I'll tell you they were Anne Kremer, Maria Emilia Salerni, Akgul Amanmuradova and Magdalena Rybarikova. Three of those final qualifying matches went to three sets, with Kelly Liggan only losing out in a final set tiebreak. Tough.