Ash Barty has moved quickly to extinguish the narrative that her hip injury was to blame for her service woes during Thursday’s 6-4 6-3 victory over Russia’s Anna Blinkova.
The top seed is safely through to the third round, where she will meet Katerina Siniakova, but the lop-sided scoreline flattered the world No.1.
Barty battled her own game for most of the 90-minute outing on centre court, producing 33 unforced errors and a worrying nine double faults.
“A few things didn’t feel quite right today but that’s half the battle in sport is being able to find a way when it’s not feeling all that great,” Barty said.
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“But I feel like when my back was against the wall today I was able to bring the good stuff, it just wasn’t quite there all the time.
“I’ve got another opportunity to now go out on the practice court, work on it and try and bring some good stuff in the third round.”
Asked about her struggles on serve against the world No.89, Barty explained: “Yeah, not my best service day but that happens as well.
“I felt like I was just out of rhythm a little bit.
“A few technical things weren’t quite feeling spot on but you have those days … it’s certainly nothing that will concern me over a longer period.”
Pressed on whether the hip injury that caused her to withdraw during her second-round match at the French Open less than a month ago had anything to do with her service woes, Barty gave an uncharacteristically terse response: “No I feel fine, just not a great serving day so it’s certainly not something I’m going to blow out of proportion.”
