Mertens battles past Watson to reach French Open third round
ARIS, France – No.16 seed Elise Mertens was forced to dig deep to defeat Heather Watson, 6-3, 6-4 and move into the third round of the French open.
The Belgian, who had won both previous meetings between the pair, broke her opponent in the very first game and led from start to finish, though was far from comfortable in a match in which there were 13 breaks of serve.
The first of these arrived in the opening game. Mertens denied Watson what would prove to be a rare chance to hold with a crushing winner down the line, then from deuce imposed herself on the match with another couple of thumping drives.
For the first part of the opener, it seemed that the WTA World No.16 would have few problems shrugging off the Brit, yet when serving at, 3-0, 40-0, she suffered an unexpected wobble, in part due to the increasing confidence of her opponent. It developed into an eight-minute game that saw Watson fight back and get on the scoreboard.
However, this merely precipitated a lengthy run of breaks, in which neither player looked at ease. In particular, they struggled with their second serves, with Watson claiming just one point from 15 opportunities from that scenario.
As Mertens claimed the set 6-3 by powering through a Watson service game to love, there had been just a single hold.
The sequence of seven consecutive breaks was ended by the seed at the beginning of the second set, though this was not yet the signal for her to move through the gears and win comfortably.
Play remained rather staccato, with little pattern, and though Mertens again held in the fifth game, Watson replied by securing her serve for the first time in the match, breaking to love, then drawing level at 4-4, showing impressive hitting off her forehand side.
With Mertens now being seriously challenged, she raised her level. After holding serve, she fashioned two match-point opportunities in the 10th game, taking the first one as her opponent hit into the net.
Mertens will now play No.24 seed Daria Gavrilova or Bernarda Pera as she seeks to move into the second week at Roland Garros for the first time.
