Mona Barthel keeps on track to defend her title while Elena Vesnina continues her impressive run in Hobart – Tennis News

Friday, January 11th, 2013 3:30:42 by

Mona Barthel keeps on track to defend her title while Elena Vesnina continues her impressive run in Hobart – Tennis News

Germany’s Mona Barthel stayed on the right path of defending her title after triumphing over the Bulgarian number one, Tsvetana Pironkova, in straight sets at the Moorilla Hobart International 2013, a WTA (Women’s Tennis Association) International level tournament taking place in Hobart, Australia. Elsewhere, Russia’s Elena Vesnina maintained consistency in her game and halted the local wild card entrant, Jarmila Gajdosova, in straight sets.

Seeded ninth in this tournament, Barthel required almost an hour to record a 6-3, 6-3 victory against Pironkova. She dropped her serve twice but broke her rival’s serve five times to prevail.

The German challenger was quoted in a courtside interview after stealing the show.

“Last year was my first time on the tour and I feel like I learned so much playing all these tournaments and playing against the top players. My serve has got better and I feel like my groundstrokes are better. Of course, last year I was playing great tennis as well, especially here, but maybe I have a little more confidence this year.”

Up next for Barthel is the Belgian star, Kirsten Flipkens, who made an epic comeback from a set down to crush Romania’s Monica Niculescu with a bagel to set up this meeting.

“The first set was really tough she just played a really tough game with the forehand slices, coming to the net when I didn’t expect it. I started, in the second set, playing more aggressive because that was the only chance for me to win this match today.”

The world number 68, Vesnina also kept her momentum rolling at this tournament. She jolted down a 6-3, 6-2 victory against Gajdosova in one hour and 21 minutes.

 

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