Maria Sharapova shakes slow start to advance at US Open

The 30-year-old will next face fellow wildcard Sofia Kenin in the third round and will fancy her chances of going deep, especially with the second-highest seed in her quarter of the draw, Johanna Konta, having been knocked out.

Two nights after her emotional return to Grand Slam action at the U.S. Open, 2006 champion Maria Sharapova was forced to dig deep to outlast big-serving Hungarian Timea Babos, 6-7 (4), 6-4, 6-1, in a two-hour, 19-minute battle that saw her get better as the match progressed. She got 68 percent of her first serves in, compared to 56 percent in the first set, while her unforced error total dropped to 12.

“I think with the way that I played Monday night, I don’t think there are any more questions”, she said.

“You sometimes wonder why you put in all the work and this is exactly why”. That was Sharapova’s sixth return victor; she would finish with 14, more than enough to counter her seven double-faults.

Friday morning (AEST) will see the commencement of third-round matches in the top half of both the men’s and women’s draws, with the schedule now back on track after what has been dubbed “Wacky Wednesday”.

Sharapova last participated in a major tournament at the 2016 Australian Open, where she tested positive for the newly banned heart drug meldonium.

Boosted by momentum swinging her way, Sharapova broke to love in the opening game of the third and there was no looking back after she moved 4-1 up, winning the first match between the duo.

Sharapova with Halep after their match.

There will still be doubts over her endurance to win seven matches in a fortnight, given the injury issues she has experienced in recent months.

Sharapova walked onto the court at Arthur Ashe Stadium to rousing applause from a clearly supportive crowd. I knew she had a hard first match here so I used that as confidence.

Now, she said, “I just have to go out and take care of business”. And I somehow did.

“It’s prime time baby”, she said.

“That’s important to me”.

My take? I vote for Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds when filling out my Baseball Hall of Fame ballot, so that should serve as enough of a short-hand explanation of my thoughts on a complex situation. There’s a certain level of ‘I know I can do this.

CoCo Vandeweghe this week said that she didn’t agree with Sharapova’s wild card, arguing it should have gone to an American instead.

The cavernous arena nearly swallowed up the famous Sharapova shriek as both the victor and error counts rocketed (the Russian’s final tally of 60 winners and 64 errors compared with 15 and 14 for Halep).

“I have had a diabolical year at these Slams”. Sharapova wouldn’t even give me a ballpark estimate. Today, it was the bad Kyrgios.

“It was not like a first-round match”.