PARIS: American tennis star Serena Williams was extremely satisfied with her first serve after overcoming former top-20 player, Romania's Mihaela Buzarnescu, 6-3, 5-7, 6-1 in the French Open second round late on Wednesday evening.
Serena, winner of three French Open titles with the last coming in 2015, won 75 per cent of the points on her first serve and said afterwards, "I felt it was pretty good today. I've been practicing my serve a lot. I've been playing in practice unbelievable on my serve. The other night (first-round match against Romania's Irina Begu) was, wow. I'm glad it came better today.
"My coach told me it's good that I'm doing it well in practice because eventually it will be good in the match. I had some really good chances in the second set to win that if I would have won just one point here or there, like four or five times. It would have been a different second set," Serena Williams told wtatennis.com.
On a day when both players looked evenly-matched, Serena had 26 winners to 27 unforced errors, while opponent Mihaela notched up 25 winners to 28 unforced. What caused the Romanian's downfall was the seven double faults she committed and her inability to smash a few aces. Serena served five aces and two double faults.
"It was like a dream for a long time to play against her, because since I was young I was following her and her sister," said Mihaela, who entered the French Open on a protected ranking despite being ranked 174th in the world.
"It was always like, let's say, like a goal to play against such a legend. I just think that I had a good match today. It's always tough to play against a player as her with such a tough serve and very powerful shots. I was really a bit disappointed at the end of the match. I couldn't finish some of the points that could have given me more chances in the final set." IANS
Also Read: Serena bows out of Emilia-Romagna Open
Also Watch: