Konta bows out of Wimbledon after tough three setter with Bouchard

British number one Johanna Konta is out of Wimbledon after falling in three sets to 2014 finalist Eugenie Bouchard. But Bouchard, who reached the final in 2014, responded well to force her way back in the match.

Bouchard unleashed a golden spell of six games with better accuracy from the baseline being nearly faultless in which she won five of those which sealed the first set, only making just one unforced error in the opening nine games.

“I just wanted to go out there, do myself proud and stay really calm”. She’s an incredibly good player. I thought she’d play well because while her ranking has gone down in the previous year, she’s an incredibly good player and has lots of experience.

There s no feeling like walking out on Centre Court at Wimbledon and I felt like I played some good tennis out there.

With that accuracy and power came the first set, and Konta’s hopes looked to be disappearing in the fresh evening air.

After winning the first set in only 33 minutes, it looked like déjà-vu all over again in the second set as Bouchard’s game fell apart, setting the stage for a dramatic third set. “No because she had a lot to say also in the outcome of the match”, Konta said.

Still the service pressure came. It’s the first career meeting between Bouchard and 16th-seed Konta. It was probably too much, too soon and she wasn’t ready to handle it.

Eugenie Bouchard reached the final at the All England Club two years ago and cracked the world’s top five.

World number two Murray will play second on the court, facing Yen-Hsun Lu from Chinese Taipei. “It’s important to get the first strike in”. There was not an very bad lot in it.

The Canadian’s career-high ranking in the year she made the Wimbledon final was No.5 and on Thursday she was down at No.48; her last year-end ranking lower than that was in 2007. If she can maintain that and gets through in a tough draw against Dominika Cibulkova then she is a contender. Twelve months ago, she was ranked world no. 126 and lost to Maria Sharapova in the first round of Wimbledon before going on an incredible run which saw her win 24 of the remaining 28 matches she would play in 2015, including 16 in a row as she won two ITF titles and reached the quarterfinals of the US Open as a qualifier, beating Wimbledon runner-up Garbine Muguruza before losing to Petra Kvitova.