Jelena Ostapenko scores massive upset of Barbora Krecjikova at Italian Open

Jelena Ostapenko in action during her second round match at the BNL Internazionali D'Italia against Barbora Krecjikova. 

Barbora Krejcikova watched herself go from having complete control of the match to slipping away at the BNL Internazionali D’Italia Sunday. Jelena Ostapenko dug in from 1-5 down, put together points streak against the Czech, and pulled off the upset on the grandstand arena, winning 7-6(2) 6-0 at the Foro Italico.

This was their sixth meeting and the first since last year when they met twice and split wins in Doha and the Australian Open. The Latvian holds the series lead, but her output has been minimal and inconsistent. In her opening match, she posted 46 winners and unforced errors, needing three sets to get into place with the Czech.

Krejcikova opened her run in Rome, getting a grip on her opening match before her opponent retired. With a couple of wins against Ostapenko, the 27-year-old had a chance to jump ahead but had to be ready for a big turn of events.

She opened the match taking control after Ostapenko held serve in the first game. After holding the Latvian to a pair of points, Krejcikova broke the 20th seed and went on a point streak exceeding 15 points. At the end of the sixth game, the Czech had a 15-point winning streak and a 5-1 lead. It all changed in the eighth when Ostapenko backed up the hold of serve with a break from the tenth-seeded contender.

She then went on a nine-point streak that assisted in her push to level the score at five-all. The surge from Ostapenko left the door open for her to make the set hers to capture. She won five games in a row, holding Krejcikova to a point before gaining the lead. Krejcikova handled the pressure in the 11th, earning points from critical mistakes made by Ostapenko that sent them to a tiebreak.

The tenth seed won the first two points before Ostapenko rallied the next three straight. Issues from the crowd made it hard for Krejcikova to focus on her serve, suffering a double fault in response. It helped Ostapenko win another three points to set up for set point and take the first in 51 minutes. On the winners' side of dominance, the Latvian tallied 13 to Krejcikova’s seven, but while both had double-digit errors, the pattern of when they occurred spoke of the change in momentum.

In the second, it stayed that way for the 20th seed, who watched Krejcikova add her fourth double fault of the match and give her a chance to break. Ostapenko pulled off a serve to love, backing up the early jump on the score. The 25-year-old rallied to another point streak, taking the third game on account of another double fault from the Czech. After 12 points played, Ostapenko won 11, showing her dominance and control.

She held Krejcikova to a point on serve in the fourth and recorded a break to love in the fifth. The 27-year-old tried to fight to avoid the bagel, forcing deuce for the first time in the match, but the Latvian was rolling too fast and took the sole AD point for the match win that finished her day in 1 hour, and 15 minutes. Krejcikova’s serve sat at 45 percent winning 23 of 49 shots from it. Ostapenko fired 21 winners in a successful momentum swing that no one saw coming.

With a major competitor out of the way, she would go into the round of 16 facing Daria Kasatkina.