Andrea Petkovic at the US Open Sports

The friendship between Andrea Petkovic and Garbine Muguruza quickly ended. It started at the beginning of the year when the two were in quarantine together in Australia and not only trained with each other there, but also got to know each other off the field. “I love her because she’s a little different — she told me, for example, that she likes to live alone in the woods,” Petkovic said before her second-round match at the US Open on Wednesday. Difficult “.

“Toughe Olle” is a player who can torment herself and not let herself be distracted by sympathy for her opponent on the field, but rather hits balls around her ears with no sense of humor. Muguruza did it in this game Louis Armstrong Stadium, but of course Petkovic is also a “hard ole”, so it was an entertaining game where two players at the same level hit each other with the felt ball so one of them couldn’t run to the ball and play it back in a field.

The deciding factor, however, was that it was only on a similar level. Petkovic was on Muguruza, she gave high-profile rallies, and she had chances; But in the end Muguruza was the tougher Olle. An example was the rally that set the ball up in Muguruza’s first round: it was a great exchange, Petkovic tried the winning hit – but it was a nanometer, maybe just a pentatonic scale too long, and in tennis it was just like games like this: you can be close And you’re still way off if the ball flies a little bit in the wrong direction in those five or six moments. Another example: Muguruza got the first break ball in the second set, which also led to the decisive win in the game, using a mesh scooter.

Peter Gojowczyk made it even better just a few steps away; As in the first round, he had to go the full distance: 2:6, 6:4, 2:6, 7:5, 6:4 beat Dusan Lajovic (Serbia). Philip Kohlschreiber (4:6, 3:6, 1:6 against Pablo Andujar, Spain) and Dominic Kupfer (4:6, 1:6, 2:6 against Daniil Medvedev, Russia) were disqualified.

Petkovic, 33, does not have to grieve despite the 4-6, 2-6 defeat, and neither did she – precisely because of this friendship with Muguruza. “We had some incredibly strong units together, which showed me how fun it was to work hard on myself and know what I could still achieve,” she said before the match, “and it was fun to play in front of spectators.” So she still had plans, oh tough Olly. .