The ongoing Australian Open recorded the highest profile casualty on day one when No. 136 player, Russian star Nina Bratchikova upset No. 19th seed, Flavia Pennetta in a thrilling encounter that ended 6-3, 1-6, 6-2.
Nina, who was in Nigeria last year’s October for the Governor’s Cup Lagos Tennis Championship fought her way from the qualifying round to the main draws of the Australian Open to make her presence felt in the first day of the Grand Slam.
Nina, who won the women’s doubles event of the first leg of the 2011 Governor’s Cup beat Pennetta in the first set 6-3, fell 1-6 in the second set. She, however, braced herself up in the last set to send packing her opponent with a resounding 6-2 win to book a place in the second round of the championship.
The 29 year-Old Russian’s performance saw her scaling the hurdles of the qualifying round of the Aussie Open when she defeated Irina Khromacheva.
It would be recalled that tournament favourite of the Governor’s Cup in 2010, Slovak Zuzana Kucova was stopped from achieving her dream of winning the Women’s Singles back to back by Nina Bratchikova with a straight sets victory of 7-5,6-1 in the final watched by Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola.
Speaking on the victory of Nina against Pennetta, Tournament Director of the Governor’s Cup, Prince Wale Oladunjoye said that Nina has been a regular face in Lagos in the past few years and he believes that the Russian star has a good future in tennis.
“I’m happy to hear the success of the player in the Australian Open which started on Monday. This also points to the reason the organisers of the Governor’s Cup bring emerging tennis stars to Lagos to rub shoulders in a good competitive environment at the Lagos Lawn Tennis Club, Onikan.
I want to say that we’ll continue to attract the best to Lagos; an emerging mega city of the world,” Prince Oladunjoye said.
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