Eva Lys makes a strong comeback in the first round of Stuttgart
Tennis player Eva Lys celebrated her first victory in more than three months at her home tournament in Stuttgart with a great fighting heart.
The 24-year-old from Hamburg defeated the former world number two Paula Badosa from Spain 2:6, 7:5, 6:4 on Tuesday evening, completing a remarkable comeback.
Lys: Late redemption
Lys was already 1:4 down in the second set before Badosa completely lost the thread. She made nine of her 15 double faults in this round. Lys was the more consistent player in the deciding set and converted her first match point after 2:15 hours. In the round of 16, Lys will face the Ukrainian Elina Svitolina, the number four seed.
Lys, who has slipped to 78th in the WTA rankings, celebrated her only singles victory this year at the beginning of January at the United Cup team competition in Australia. She was then eliminated in the first round at the Australian Open and in Miami and Charleston.
Tennis: Siegemund awaits Swiatek
Lys recently had to miss out on playing for the German team at the Billie Jean King Cup due to persistent knee problems and the DTB team was relegated to third place in Portugal. Ella Seidel, who had played in the disastrous performance, had previously lost 3:6, 4:6 to Elise Mertens (Belgium) in Stuttgart on Tuesday.
Tamara Korpatsch was also knocked out in the first round late in the evening against world number 19 Diana Schnaider 3:6, 1:6. Before Lys, only Laura Siegemund had reached the round of 16 in the clay tournament, which has prize money of 1,206,446 US dollars. Siegemund now has to play the third seeded co-favorite Iga Swiatek (Poland).