WTA Lugano: Voegele beats Cornet. Giorgi, Barthel and Mertens reach QF



by JOVICA ILIC

WTA Lugano: Voegele beats Cornet. Giorgi, Barthel and Mertens reach QF

Camila Giorgi will play in her second quarter-final of the season after a commanding 6-2 6-1 triumph over the 9th seed Alison Van Uytvanck in an hour and 7 minutes. Giorgi scored a win in their only previous meeting in Miami 2015 and she was the dominant figure on the court again, losing just 17 points in eight service games and dropping serve once.

She was even more impressive on the return, stealing 60% of the points in the Belgian's games and creating 12 break points, claiming five breaks to control the scoreboard from start to finish. In fact, Van Uytvanck saved three break points in the second game of the match and she broke in the following game to take a 2-1 lead, her only in the match.

Camila found the range of her shots after that, rattling off five games in a row to take the set 6-2, breaking the Belgian three times in a row to gain the momentum before the rest of the match. She sailed through her service games in set number two and Alison couldn't stay on the same track, losing serve in games two and six to hit the exit door after another good hold from the Italian at 5-1.

19-year-old Vera Lapko has failed to qualify for seven tournaments this season, finally earning a chance to play in the main draw of Charleston where she retired in the first round to Mihaela Buzarnescu. She is looking much better here in Lugano, reaching the quarter-final as a qualifier after a 6-2 6-3 win over another qualifier Danka Kovinic in an hour and 16 minutes. This will be the first quarter-final for the young Belarusian since Moscow last October and she got there with a better performance in the crucial points, saving six out of seven break points and claiming four breaks of serve to move forward in straight sets.

Both players struggled to find the first serve and Vera managed to control her initial shot and groundstrokes in a more superior way, overcoming a slow start to dictate the pace in the rest of the opening set. She saved five break points in games three and five, and another one in game seven and Kovinic had to pay the price for missing opportunities, suffering break in games six and eight (she won just one point in those two games) to drop the opener 6-2.

Danka went 3-1 in front in set number two with a break in the first game but that was all we saw from her, losing the ground in the remaining games and allowing Lapko to seize the last five games of the encounter to book the place in the last eight.

Vera performed a turnaround with breaks in games six and eight, just like in the opening set, and she crossed the finish line with a hold at love at 5-3. Second round results:

↓ SHOW RESULTS ↓

ALSO READ: ATP Monte Carlo - MAIN DRAW: Rafael Nadal could face Novak Djokovic in QF!

Tamara Korpatsch Vera Lapko