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Maria Sharapova couldn’t keep her problems at bay long enough in her match against Angelique Kerber on Thursday. The Russian made too many mistakes and struggled to make up for them against the German, falling in straight sets at the Mallorca Open. Kerber's 6-2, 6-3 win was her fourth consecutive positive result against the five-time Grand slam champion.
This marked the ninth time the two superstars of the sport were meeting, and the second played on grass. Kerber won their first at Wimbledon 2014 in a competitive three-setter, which started her winning streak against Sharapova.
The Russian’s return to action in Mallorca after nearly five months off the tour came with a straight sets win over Viktoria Kuzmova. But unlike the start she had in the opening round, she allowed Kerber some room to get a break swiftly.
The German consolidated with a hold, and the 32-year-old then got on the board in her second service game. But Kerber was untroubled on serve and notched up a 3-1 lead with another hold.
Sharapova found a way to add another service hold despite the tough forehand returns of Kerber that forced her to go to deuce twice. The German's tactics eventually took their toll on the former World No. 1 though, as Kerber soon reached a chance for a double break. But she then erred twice on the return to give the Russian another lifeline.
An unfortunate error by Sharapova where the ball landed just long of the baseline gave the 31-year-old another shot. And the top seed finally took her chance and wrapped up the set in 40 minutes. It was an impressive performance by the World No. 6 as she committed only two unforced errors in the set and hit 11 winners.
Sharapova was in trouble early in the second set as she committed her fourth double fault of the match. But she somehow recovered a lost point and managed to hold off Kerber in the opening game.
Kerber then took control of the set by winning the next two games with the same attacking style for which Sharapova had no answer.
The Russian ended Kerber’s short winning streak by holding in the fifth but continued to sit two games down when the number one seed followed suit in the next game. Sharapova battled hard in the seventh game but double faults continued to give her problems and opened chances for Kerber to get another break.
Sharapova made up for some of the faults with winners but after a few more break points, an error ended her attempts to gain control and gave Kerber the opportunity to serve for the match.
Sharapova fought well to delay the end of her tournament and jumped at the chance for break point which she secured on a great crosscourt slice. Though she had started returning well, her serve continued to flounder, giving Kerber three match points. The German sealed it on a wide shot to bring an end to the second round in 1 hour and 31 minutes.
With her best run on the Spanish island so far, the 31-year-old will take on Caroline Garcia in the quarterfinal tomorrow.
