MONTREAL, July 28, (APP/AFP) – Venus Williams breezed into the third round of the Rogers Cup in Montreal on Wednesday with a straight sets rout of Barbora Strycova as home hope Eugenie Bouchard upset 11th seed Dominika Cibulkova.
Sixth seed Williams, 36, showed no sign of lingering weariness following her defeat in the final of the WTA Stanford event in California lastweekend, maintaining her 100 percent record over Strycova with a 6-3, 6-0 win.
Williams was pleased to have wrapped up the win in under an hour after a marathon three-hour battle with Strycova in their previous encounter.
“It was definitely more straightforward I think than all of our other matches,” Williams said.
“I didn’t mind that, especially after playing a lot last week, just to be able to come out and hopefully advance to the next round.
“It’s been intense. Usually I don’t play this much back-to-back. But I knew what I was going to do going into the year, what it was going to take.”
Strycova paid the price for a failure to put pressure on Williams’ suspect service game in the second set.
Strycova managed to earn only one break point—unconverted—but was in turn broken three times as Williams raced into the next round.
Elsewhere Tuesday, Canada’s Bouchard delighted her hometown crowd with a 6-2, 6-0 drubbing of Cibulkova.
