Roger Federer gets lucky on Mannarino’s birthday at Wimbledon | Tennis News – Times of India

Roger Federer was in deep water in his first-round match against Adrian Mannarino. The eight-time champion was trailing by two-sets-to-one when he finally appeared to have hit stride in the fourth set, taking a 4-1 lead. Mannarino then slipped in the seventh game of the fourth essay, coming down heavily on his left knee.
The Frenchman needed medical attention. When the match resumed, the world No. 41 won one point before Federer levelled at two sets apiece.
Mannarino attempted to start the fifth set before calling a stop to the exchange. Federer went through with a 6-4, 6-7 (3), 3-6, 6-2 result.

“It’s awful, one shot can change a match, a season, a career, he could’ve won definitely, he was the better player for much of the match,” Federer said.
“Not like this please (to make the second round), but that’s how it goes, I’m obviously happy I got another chance for another match.”
TEARFUL SERENA BOWS OUT
Injury caused heartache to 23-time Grand Slam winner Serena Williams too. She retired in the first set after she hurt her leg in her opening-round match against Aliaksandra Sasnovich of Belarus. Williams slipped while hitting a forehand in the fifth game.

She began walking gingerly, and after losing that game went to the locker room. She returned to continue, but with the score 3-all, her leg buckled during a rally and she crumpled to the court.
Williams rose and cried as she walked to the net to concede. There were tears of a different kind in the first match on Centre Court.
BARTY WINS TIE, SUAREZ HEARTS
Carla Suarez Navarro, fighter nonpareil, playing only her second tournament since announcing her recovery from Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in April, lent to the moment on Centre Court as much with her song of a single-handed backhand, a throwback to the days when Evonne Goolagong reigned, as with her story that has seen the tennis world come together as one to cheer a fellow competitor.
Fittingly then, a weary Suarez Navarro, once ranked No. 6 in the world, broke the World No. 1 when she served for the match in the second set, dragging the contest into the decider.
Barty shifted gears and took control of the last exchange, closing it out for the loss of just six points. The 24-year-old Barty won 6-1, 6-7 (1-7), 6-1 in an hour and 44 minutes, but there were only winners on Centre Court on Tuesday afternoon.

As the Spaniard made her way out of the storied facility to a standing ovation led by Barty, her misty-eyed mother Lali Navarro, in the players box, captured the moment on her phone.
“Carla played a great tiebreak. She’s a hell of a competitor, a hell of a fighter. It was a privilege to be able to share that moment, share that court with her,” the top seed said.
After the wobble late in the second set when Suarez Navarro came up with two stinging backhand winners, Barty was at the top of her game in the decider, winning the first 13 points of the deciding set which she then proceeded to close out in 21 minutes.
Five-time champion Venus Williams pulled off a 7-5, 4-6, 6-3 win over Romania’s Mihaela Buzarnescu in her 90th Grand Slam appearance. A five-time singles champion at the All England Club who is making her 23rd appearance there, Williams also began her record-extending tournament with a 90th career victory