After storming through the entire Nature Valley International last week, Czech Republic’s Karolina Pliskova had to break a sweat in her first-round match against world No.101 Zhu Lin of China at Wimbledon.
The third-seeded Pliskova won the first set in 27 minutes, in the style that led her to the grass-court title in Eastbourne, but was challenged in the second set and even faced multiple set points as Zhu recorded the first break in the set to lead 6-5. The following game lasted more than 10 minutes and included some 5 deuces, but eventually Pliskova prevailed and forced a tiebreak.