China\u2019s Zheng Qinwen defeated Cristina Bucsa of Spain in the second round of the WTA Italian Open on Thursday, winning 7-6 (6), 6-2 in one hour and 35 minutes.<\/p>\n
It was the first meeting between the two players. Zheng secured an early break in the opening game, but double-faulted while serving for the set, allowing Bucsa to break back and level the score at 5-5.<\/p>\n
In the 12th game, Zheng held her nerve to save two set points and force a tiebreak. Trailing 1-4 in the tiebreak, the Chinese battled back to take the opening set 7-6 (6).<\/p>\n
Zheng faced an early test at the start of the second set, but rallied from 40-0 down in the opening game to save three break points and hold serve.<\/p>\n
She then capitalized on a double fault from Bucsa to break in the fourth game before sealing the set 6-2.<\/p>\n
Zheng said after the match that she was still not at her best, but added that more matches would help her improve.
\u201cI\u2019ve kept talking about concentration,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cRight now maybe I can stay focused for eight or nine games, but when I had just come back, I couldn\u2019t even maintain my focus well for three or four games.<\/p>\n
I think I just need to take it slowly, play match by match and first make sure I win the matches.\u201d<\/p>\n
Zheng has now compiled a 12-3 career record in Rome, the tournament where she has earned the most main-draw wins on tour.<\/p>\n
She also praised the playing conditions and atmosphere in the Italian capital.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst of all, Rome is at an altitude that feels very comfortable for me,\u201d she said. \u201cAlso, the fans here are always very enthusiastic.<\/p>\n
Today, when I felt a bit low in energy, I could really feel both the Chinese fans and the local fans cheering for me, and that encouraged me a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her third-round opponent will be either Elena-Gabriela Ruse or Jelena Ostapenko.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"China\u2019s Zheng Qinwen defeated Cristina Bucsa of Spain in the second round of the WTA Italian Open on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":631528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":["post-631527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/631527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=631527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/631527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/631528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=631527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=631527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=631527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}