Karolina Pliskova concedes she’s felt the jitters during the US Open first week.
Now, she’s hoping the fun begins.
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The world No. 1 powered through eight consecutive games thrashing shell-shocked American Jennifer Brady, 6-1, 6-0, rolling into her second straight US Open quarterfinal.
Pliskova said saving a match point in her three-set comeback win over Zhang Shuai relaxed her for today’s rout in which she won 22 of 24 first-serve points.
Now she’s hoping to have fun on court.
“Even though I was not playing well the first three matches, I just felt great today. Definitely gave me a lot of confidence that I got through this one,” Pliskova said. “Hopefully I'm going to feel much better and much, you know, like enjoying the tennis what I was doing today. So I was not really enjoying myself the first three matches. I'd like to start to enjoy a little bit more.”
The 2016 US Open finalist must defeat either CoCo Vandeweghe or Czech compatriot Lucie Safarova in the quarterfinals for a shot to retain her world No. 1 ranking.
Practice makes perfect.
In Pliskova’s case, no practice was perfect preparation for her US Open eruption.
“Sometimes you just need to have some of those matches where you can just really get through it," Pliskova said. “You don't even know why, but the game improve so much. So I didn't change anything. I didn't even practice yesterday. So there is nothing really what I did different. But I just felt much better.”
Photo credit: @USOpen