{"id":11559,"date":"2019-01-15T21:00:34","date_gmt":"2019-01-16T02:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/?p=11559"},"modified":"2019-01-15T21:00:34","modified_gmt":"2019-01-16T02:00:34","slug":"2019-australian-open-three-matches-to-watch-on-day-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2019\/01\/15\/2019-australian-open-three-matches-to-watch-on-day-3\/","title":{"rendered":"2019 Australian Open: Three matches to watch on Day 3"},"content":{"rendered":"

The second round of the\u00a0Australian Open<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>gets underway as 32 matches on both the men’s and women’s side will be contested. Here’s three of the best:<\/p>\n

Kevin Anderson vs Frances Tiafoe<\/strong><\/h2>\n

This will be a huge test for the 20-year old, who is progressing nicely under the tutelage of former\u00a0U.S. Open\u00a0<\/strong>semifinalist\u00a0Robby Ginepri.\u00a0<\/strong>Wins over\u00a0Hyeon Chung, Denis Shapovalov\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0Juan Martin Del Potro\u00a0<\/strong>to win his first title in\u00a0Delray Beach\u00a0<\/strong>last year as well as competitive matches in New York against\u00a0Roger Federer\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0John Isner\u00a0<\/strong>prove the American won’t be intimidated by the occasion. He’ll need to be on top of his game (which is very powerful and fluid) against the world number five, who has started the year in fine form, winning in\u00a0Pune.\u00a0<\/strong>If Tiafoe can keep up with Anderson on serve, he has a chance to pull off the upset.<\/p>\n

Gael Monfils vs Taylor Fritz\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n

A classic case of the veteran (Monfils) against the youngster (Fritz). The 20-year old already has a big win over Isner in\u00a0Auckland\u00a0<\/strong>and is serving well (he also avenged his loss to\u00a0Cameron Norrie\u00a0<\/strong>from Auckland in the first round here). A power player, the American will want to take charge of the points early with his forehand against the flashy Frenchman, who, after all these years, is still content playing miles behind the baseline and defend rather than take charge from the baseline. The 30th seed certainly has the edge in movement and experience, but he could be hit off the court. This may very well go a long time.<\/p>\n

Anett Kontaveit vs Aliaksandra Sasnovich\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Separated by only 13 spots in the rankings, it wouldn’t be a surprise if Sasnovich won. She’s in excellent form and looked dominant in the first round against the tricky\u00a0Kirsten Flipkens.\u00a0<\/strong>Kontaveit also looked good in her opening round victory over\u00a0Sara Sorribes Tormo,\u00a0<\/strong>losing just four games. Their games are very similar: powerful serves and groundstrokes, this could very well be decided by very slim margins. I suspect both will want to pick on the other’s forehand. Kontaveit needs this win more. Whether she gets it is another story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The second round of the\u00a0Australian Open\u00a0gets underway as 32 matches on both the men’s and women’s side will be contested. Here’s three of the best: Kevin Anderson vs Frances Tiafoe This will be a huge test for the 20-year old, who is progressing nicely under the tutelage of former\u00a0U.S. Open\u00a0semifinalist\u00a0Robby Ginepri.\u00a0Wins over\u00a0Hyeon Chung, Denis Shapovalov\u00a0and\u00a0Juan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":755,"featured_media":11292,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,3,4],"tags":[4066,888,887,259,348,144,1115,347,364],"class_list":["post-11559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australian-open","category-atp","category-wta","tag-2019-australian-open","tag-aliaksandra-sasnovich","tag-anett-kontaveit","tag-atp-tour","tag-frances-tiafoe","tag-gael-monfils","tag-kevin-anderson","tag-taylor-fritz","tag-wta-tour"],"modified_by":"Yesh Ginsburg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/755"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11559\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}