Poland’s Agnieszka Radwanska stretched her winning streak to six matches with a straight sets victory over Japan veteran Kimiko Date-Krumm in brutal heat at the Sydney International yesterday.
As temperatures soared above 41 degrees Celsius, the tournament top seed overcame an early break before wearing down 42-year-old Date-Krumm, winning 6-4, 6-3 in 70 minutes.
Radwanska, 23, went into the Sydney event immediately off the back of a win in Auckland without dropping a set, and is in great form heading into next week’s Australian Open in Melbourne.
“So far I feel fine. I don’t have any problems and it’s (the) beginning of the year,” said Radwanska, who next plays Italian Roberta Vinci.
Radwanska played in her first Grand Slam final last year at Wimbledon where she lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At one stage last year she reached world number two before slipping to her current four.
German second seed Angelique Kerber overcame Kazakh qualifier Galina Voskoboeva 6-2, 7-5 and said playing in the heat was going to help her in Melbourne later on this month.
“I think it’s a good preparation for Melbourne. Melbourne’s weather can be the same,” Kerber said.
“So, it’s okay to have matches in this heat and prepare before Melbourne.”
Former world no.1 Caroline Wozniacki went down in a titanic duel with former French and US Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova 7-6, 1-6, 6-2.
China’s fourth seed Li Na, who won in Sydney two years ago, breezed past Japanese qualifier Ayumi Morita, 6-1, 6-0, while Italian third seed Sara Errani downed Russian Maria Kirilenko, 6-1, 6-1.
In the men’s event, Bernard Tomic won the all-Australian night match with the country’s number one ranked player Marinko Matosevic 6-3, 6-4.
Tomic continued his impressive unbeaten start to the southern summer season, including the prized scalp of world number one Novak Djokovic at last week’s Hopman Cup mixed teams event in Perth.
Spaniard Feliciano Lopez recovered from losing the opening set tiebreaker to knock out French seventh seed Jeremy Chardy 6-7, 7-5, 6-3, while Australian wild card John Millman surprised Spaniard Tommy Robredo 6-3, 6-4.