As 6-2 6-2 scorelines go, this was a pretty lively first round match.  Venus Williams produced an impressive display to defeat the 19-year-old, Katerina Siniakova in 76 minutes.  I’ve read a lot about Siniakova and watcheds snippets of her matches.  This was perhaps her most high profile match on a streamed court… It’s safe to say, she’s a wild one! The match began with a 16 minute + opening game that saw Venus convert on her seventh break point.  Siniakova had six game points in the first game, double faulting on two of them.  The match could have swung a different way if Siniakova had won that game.  The first set was much closer than the scoreline suggested.  Siniakova also had game points at 1-4 *40-15, but Venus was on the ball tonight.  Although she wasted a handful of break points in the first game, she was very clinical in her service games.

There was a pretty cute moment when Siniakova was in floods of tears on the changeover towards the end of the first set and they showed her on the big screen.  The crowd started clapping and Siniakova started smiling.  I’ve heard about Siniakova but hadn’t quite cottoned on to how emotional she is on the court.  She’s still very young and inexperienced on tour and I hope she can harness all that emotion more positively in the not too distant future.  As to be expected, it impacted negatively on her game and also, sends a message to her opponent.  Her game is pretty funky too.  The service motion is interesting to say the least and the serve is the area of her game that requires most work.  Her groundstrokes are decent, particularly the backhand.  She does some pretty odd head movements on the backhand but that’s where the majority of her winners came in this match.  Her down-the-line shots were working really well today and she can hit angles too.  Another positive aspect of Siniakova’s game was her movement, both side-to-side and up the court.

Venus played a very clean match, hitting 19 winners to 11 unforced errors and didn’t face any break points.  There was no walkabout or anything as she stayed focussed on the task at hand.  Venus was aggressive and closed into the net when she could, which was a smart tactic against Siniakova who was getting a lot of balls back.  I thought Venus would win this match, but I expected it to be much, much closer.  In the second round, Venus will play Flavia Pennetta or Elina Svitolina in what will be an intriguing match on Wednesday’s schedule.