Signs of Samantha Stosur’s competitive appetite were visible throughout her return to Roland Garros today. The crocodile on her cap complemented the bold bite in her game as Stosur sank her teeth into the tournament, chomping Czech Iveta Benesova, 6-2, 6-3, to reach the second round for the fifth straight year.
Commanding the center of the court as if directing traffic on the Champs-Elysées, Stosur sent Benesova scurrying from side-to-side. The 28-year-old lefty was a step slow and a shot shy of making any significant impression on the 2010 French Open finalist.
Stosur’s tremendous topspin creates an unsettling prospect for opponents cast in the unfamiliar position of having to handle shoulder-high bounces. Up 3-1, she slammed an ace down the middle and moments later won her fourth straight game when Benesova banged a backhand into the net. Her sense of self-belief shrinking, Benesova dumped a double-fault to face a second set point. On it, Stosur cracked a cross-court forehand that a lunging Benesova couldn’t handle, scoring her third break to seize the first set in 34 minutes. Thirty-four minutes later, Stosur wrapped up the comprehensive 68-minute win when Benesova slapped a low forehand into the middle of the net.
It was about as comfortable an opening-rounder Stosur could ask for—she had not surrendered a set to Benesova in three prior encounters, including a 6-1, 7-5 win in Rome two weeks ago—and the athletic Aussie consistently created court openings with her crunching topspin forehand that pushed Benesova behind the baseline.
Stosur’s serve is one of the most dangerous shots in the women’s field. She dropped serve to start the match, but was almost untouchable the rest of the way. With the same toss, Stosur can crank her hellacious kick serve into the corners or crack a flatter first serve up the T, and that deception made Benesova’s task of deciphering the delivery about as easy as reading an SOS message scrawled on the surface of a lake.
The eighth-seeded Stosur slammed seven aces, didn’t double fault and permitted just nine points on her first serve during the match. At a time when many Top 10 women possess serves that are about as imposing as a harp at a heavy metal concert, Stosur stands out because she can dictate play with it.
Stosur is at her best hitting the kick serve to set up her favored forehand—a potent punch that’s even more explosive on clay, where she has time to run around her weaker backhand wing—and that combination could be even more lethal this year, as players report the new Babolat balls (Babolat replaced Dunlop as the official ball of the French Open this year) are playing lighter and faster.
Next up for Stosur is Simona Halep, whom Stosur stopped 7-5, 6-1 in the first round last year before beating three former top-ranked players—Justine Henin, Serena Williams and Jelena Jankovic—to reach the final.
—Richard Pagliaro