Serena Williams wins Cincinnati opener in straight sets

Serena Williams pumped her fist after each important point and screamed as she smacked another emphatic shot.

Numerous top level ATP and WTA tennis players have descended upon Cincinnati, OH this week for two reasons: one, because it’s mandatory to do so and, two, in order to take advantage of the final opportunity to work out the kinks in their hard court games before the year’s final Slam, the U.S. Open.

Williams’ sister, Venus, dropped out of the tournament Tuesday night with an illness.

In other women’s action Romanian third seed Simona Halep beat Frenchwoman Kristina Mladenovic 7-5 5-7 6-4 while Czech seventh seed Lucie Safarova advanced with a 6-4 7-5 win over American wild card Coco Vandeweghe. Rain fell just as the match ended.

Federer had not competed since losing in the Wimbledon final to Novak Djokovic and he quickly shook off the rust, needing just an hour and nine minutes to beat Agut. “I was up the whole match and just couldn’t finish the second set, but I tried to stay focused for every ball, and I think we played a really good match”. More rain pushed back the evening matches and forced organizers to postpone the doubles matches.

It turns out that break points may have been the key to the match.

“It was a unusual match all in all, but the instructions I got from the coach was to expect the unexpected, and that was the case”, Djokovic said.

In the men’s section yesterday, Roland Garros champion Stan Wawrinka rallied to tame teenaged Croatian Borna Coric 3-6, 7-6 (7/3), 6-3 as Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis lost in the second round.

The French Open champion didn’t take control until he broke Coric’s serve in the sixth game of the third set and then held for a 5-2 lead. Wawrinka produced 40 winners and 52 unforced errors as he moved into the third round against another Croatian, Ivo Karlovic. The Italian beat Russia’s Daria Gavrilova 6-4, 6-1 on Wednesday.