BIRMINGHAM–
Yulia Putintseva secured her first ever win over a No.1 player as she came through in a mostly-comfortable straight sets victory against Naomi Osaka 6-2 6-3 in the Birmingham second round.
The opening exchanges of this encounter were always going to be crucial in the long term for Putintseva. Could she really affect the confidence of the World No.1 enough from the baseline? That would cause additional impact later on, and she had an absolutely exceptional beginning to the match. Putintseva put together all of the first five games, breaking the Osaka serve twice. She even held a set point to nearly convert on a bagel set before Osaka claimed just her first of two service holds in the entire match.
Putintseva was playing with very little fear of or admiration for her opponent. The Kazakh had a seriously strong day on the return of serve, consistently managing to maintain great depth from that first shot of hers in the rally and never allowing Osaka to get her feet set and feel comfortable on the court. In this sort of matchup, Putintseva always faces the serious threat of being dominated for pace, but it was the depth control that she continued to use all match that really took Osaka out of a comfortable rhythm and out of her desired comfort within the baseline rallies on the grass.
As is usually the case with Putintseva, she was able to limit what she gave away cheaply from the baseline. Putintseva will never possess the biggest and most fearful of weapons to earn points quickly. What she can do is make herself hard to break down, use her movement wisely, and keep the unforced error count down to an absolute minimum. She successfully did that Thursday by hitting just nine unforced errors all match, while Osaka was a bit more generous, making 37 errors from the baseline and looking rather displeased with her game from the outset.
The real issue for Osaka was really the fact she was coughing up big forehand unforced errors within a couple of shots of each rally. Before you knew it, she was down 5-0 in the opening set and staring at an incredibly difficult deficit to overcome. Flashes certainly appeared at times, where she looked like she may turn things around, but the overall stomach for the fight was questionable at times. Osaka’s body language left a lot to be desired, in particular in the first set. Osaka also didn’t serve anywhere near as well as she can, even on a grass court. She held serve just a couple of times and looking ultimately pressured for valuable time whenever Putintseva got her racquet on a return ball.
Putintseva looked utterly delighted with the way she executed a steady game-plan throughout the contest after the big win:
“It feels great… I think my baseline game was today very consistent, which was very fortunate for me. So I’m happy with my level, and I’m happy the way I played today. She’s always been playing great—even though we played last year before she won, like, so many titles, I could feel her level [then], how she played, with her shots so heavy, the serve is very strong. So from the last time that we played, I remember that, I remembered that I had to be very focused on my game and to be strong on the baseline, and just run, try to get everything back, and just do my best. Yeah, that was a very good match for me, and I’m very happy.”
The Kazakh noted that the good work she’d done earlier on in the year and the accumulation of matches helped her out a lot, and she is now seeing that hard work come into fruition on a surface she has struggled to get wins on in the past:
“Definitely the title in Nurnberg gave me more confidence in my game, but I don’t think I start to play much better. I was playing good already Nurnberg and the weeks before when I was playing Miami Open, and my game was getting there and getting a little bit better.
“It just was a matter of how many matches you play more than titles. I got a lot of matches this year and the beginning of the year. That’s what helped me to grow up my level a little bit.”
This is Putintseva’s first win in four tries against a World No.1. All three previous matches came against then-No.1 Serena Williams.
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