Garbiñe Muguruza is still blocked and says goodbye in the first round of Australia

MADRID, 17 Ene. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Spanish tennis player Garbiñe Muguruza has said goodbye in the first round of the Australian Open, the first 'Grand Slam' of the season, after wasting her advantage at the decisive moment and falling this Tuesday against the Belgian Elise Mertens (3-6, 7- 6(3), 6-1).

Again, the Spanish-Venezuelan gave up in her first match of a 'big', as has happened in six of the last 14 'Grand Slam' played since Wimbledon 2019, confirming her worrying start to 2023, with three defeats, five in a row since last September.

All in a match in which the Spanish, finalist in Melbourne in 2020 and who dropped to number 73 in the WTA ranking on Monday, managed to get ahead thanks to two breaks in the first set, which neutralized the one achieved by Mertens.

Both tennis players exchanged 'breaks' in the first games of the second set, in which Muguruza found himself with a golden opportunity to close the match when he managed to get 6-5 with serve. However, his rival canceled the occasion and finally took the set in the 'tie-break'.

It was the end of Muguruza, mentally broken and only able to win her first serve of the final set before Mertens won the next six games to conclude the contest after just over two and a half hours of battle.

After the match, Muguruza lamented the "hard" defeat he had received. "It is difficult for me to close the matches in two sets and that makes my rival have the feeling that he can come back and get stronger," acknowledged the former world number one and winner of two 'big'.

"Now I have to work with humility and go unnoticed to climb again," she added about her position in the ranking (73). "I will have to make a calendar suitable to my ranking. Now I will try to play the tournaments in the Middle East, but if I can't I will have to see others of a lower category", she concluded.