Faith Nyabera and Judith Nkatha overcame strong challenges from their respective opponents to advance to the second round of the ITF World Tennis Tour at Peponi School in Ruiru.
Nyabera displayed her class by edging out Indian Vibhasree Gowda 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 in a tough encounter. Playing catch-up for one set, Nkatha came from behind to beat Gabonese Manuella Nyonda 5-7, 6-2, 6-3 in an entertaining contest.
Nyabera began the match positively, dominating her opponent in the first set with powerful returns and serves for the loss of one game.
Gowda came back stronger in the second set to tie the game. She took advantage of her quick serves to seal the set as Nyabera made too many unforced errors.
Nyabera regrouped in the third set and ended the Indian's resistance to carry the day. The two exchanged the lead to 2-2 before Nyabera surged forward to lead 5-2. Gowda won the eight-game but straight points sealed the win for the Kenyan in one hour 41 minutes.
Nyabera was delighted with her performance in the topsy-turvy contest. “My serve was not as good as I expected and my opponents capitalised on the situation. I had a number of double faults and that really pulled me down. I tried to hit the ball hard in the first set but that resulted in a number of faults. My reception also didn’t work well,” she said.
It was a slightly different game in the second match for Kenya as Nkatha had to fight hard for her win against a strong Gabonese in a match that lasted two hours seven minutes.
The match began on a high note with the two exchanging the lead to tie 5-5 at some point before the Gabonese scrapped through 7-5. Nkatha, who blamed the first loss on tension and tight muscles changed her game in the second set to take a 3-1 lead.
Nyonda reduced the gap to a point but that was the best she could manage in the set as Nkatha went on to win 6-3. It was slightly the same script in the third as the set settled at 2-2 before Nkatha surged to a 4-2 lead.
She managed this by capitalising on Nyonda’s weakness on the forehand to seal the set 6-3 in 31 minutes. “She was waiting for me to make errors but I didn’t allow that to happen. I realised that she was not struggling with her forehand and fully took advantage of that,” Nkatha said.