Top seed Simona Halep overcomes major scare and horror injury to beat teen Destanee Aiava
Updated 16/01/2018 at 14:45 GMT
Top seed Simona Halep almost lost the first set to teenage wild card Destanee Aiava and then suffered a nasty injury before recovering to win 7-6(5) 6-1 in the first round of the Australian Open.
Halep was 5-2 down in the first set to the 17-year-old Australian, who looked fearless as she took on the woman top of the WTA rankings.
But Aiava, who had two set points, seemed to suffer from exhaustion and required treatment, with Halep fighting back to win a tie-break.
The Romanian then went over on her ankle in seemingly disastrous fashion in the second set, but following treatment returned to court.
She showed all her experience as Aiava faded badly – but the 17-year-old’s performance on Rod Laver Arena will not be forgotten.
Join 3M+ users on app
Download
Scan me
Related Topics
Share this article