Kerber crumbles against Cornet in Montreal

Playing her first match since winning her third Grand Slam title at Wimbledon last month, Angelique Kerber came crashing back to earth in a straight-sets defeat by Alize Cornet.

The world No.4 was never able to get going in the 6-4 6-1 loss, which sends Cornet through to a third-round match against 15th seed Ashleigh Barty.

Barty beat Alison Van Uytvanck in straight sets to reach the last 16 in Canada for the second straight year.

While Kerber was the highest seed to depart, there were no such troubles for No.3 seed Sloane Stephens, who beat local wildcard Francoise Abanda for the loss of just two games.

Stephens’ 6-0 6-2 win was perhaps closer than the scoreline suggested, extending an hour and 20 minutes and featuring several games that were tense battles at deuce.

Yet the reigning US Open champion, who reached the semifinals at last year’s event when it was played in Toronto, secured her place in the third round, where she will meet Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro.

“I’ve played her a couple times before. I think it will be a good match,” Stephens said.

“Obviously third round here, it’s going deeper into the tournament and whoever you’re playing is good. She obviously won two matches. I’m just going to go out and play my best, do all I can to compete well.”

Another big winner was five-time major champion Maria Sharapova, who demolished 12th seed Daria Kasatkina.

A day after belting Bulgarian qualifier Sesil Karatantcheva, Sharapova made it two in a row with a 6-0 6-2 win over her fellow Russian.

“I came in with a similar mindset (to yesterday), just a focused mindset that I needed to carry on to today’s match,” said Sharapova, who struck 25 forehand winners during the match to Kasatkina’s three.

“I came into the match with a lot of respect for my opponent. She’s had really good results. She’s No.12 in the world. You can’t take that very lightly, especially for a second round. I thought, yeah, with everything, I took that and I made good use of it.”

Cornet gets her big match against Kerber

Frenchwoman Cornet was originally scheduled to meet Serena Williams in the first round in Montreal before the 23-time Slam champ withdrew due to personal reasons.

“I was very excited to play against her in the first round. I was picturing a night session on Centre Court, and I was very excited about that,” Cornet told WTA Insider.

Instead she lined up against Tatjana Maria, but got her wish to play on Centre Court when she won that match to set up a meeting with Kerber, who received a first-round bye.

The world No.34 came out firing, breaking serve twice on her way to a 5-2 lead in the first set and in the second set eventually converting her sixth break point in the sixth game for a 5-1 lead, a game that appeared to crush Kerber’s spirit.

.@alizecornet moves on in Montreal!

Upsets Kerber 6-4, 6-1! #CoupeRogers pic.twitter.com/Ng6FTWnAhU

— WTA (@WTA) August 8, 2018

“It is always not so easy to change also the surface. I think I need a little bit more time to get used to hard court again, to have a lot of matches, a lot of practice sessions on hard,” Kerber said.

For Cornet, it was her second straight victory over the German after also winning their clash at last year’s China Open in Beijing.

And thanks to her title on clay in Gstaad three weeks ago, she has now won seven of her past eight matches.

“I didn’t adopt the same tactic last year in Beijing than today – I know also she improved herself in the last six months a lot,” Cornet said.

“Last year I was more focused about playing the forehand, moving her. It was different tactic today. It was more like playing on the backhand side, also being aggressive. It was different, and I’m happy I actually adapted my tactic depending on her, and that I could do it the whole match.”