LONDON: About an hour after flopping on her back and kicking her feet overhead to celebrate a stunning comeback against defending Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, Jelena Jankovic still was giddy.

“I cannot stop smiling. ... I was very brave at the end. You know, here I am,” she said through a giggle. “Unbelievable.”

Jankovic kept using that word — “unbelievable” — as if trying to convince herself it were true that, despite never having much success on grass courts, she had put together a 3-6, 7-5, 6-4 victory Saturday over the second-seeded Kvitova, who claimed the 2011 and 2014 titles at the All England Club.

“I was a little bit better at the end,” the 28th-seeded Jankovic said. “I was a little bit lucky, as well.”

The 30-year-old Serbian didn’t come out of nowhere: She was the runner-up at the 2008 US Open and finished that season ranked No 1.

But she has never been past the fourth round at Wimbledon, hadn’t even made it that far since 2010, and won only one of five matches at the grass-court major over the last four years.

Kvitova, who led 4-2 in the second set, had a difficult time processing the match, too.

“I’m not really sure what happened out there,” she said. “Suddenly, I was just missing [shots]. So it was really unusual, probably, or weird. I can’t really explain.”

After the traditional middle Sunday off, play resumes on Monday. The top half of the women’s draw includes the most noteworthy matchup: Serena Williams v Venus Williams, meeting at a major for the first time since 2009.

Those two, Maria Sharapova and Victoria Azarenka give that side of the bracket 34 Grand Slam titles.

And the eight women on the other half? They own zero major championships. That includes Jankovic, who meets 2012 runner-up and Polish 13th seed Agnieszka Radwanska next.

Also on Monday, Danish fifth seed Caroline Wozniacki faces 20th-seeded Garbine Muguruza of Spain, Romania’s Monica Niculescu is up against Swiss 15th seed Timea Bacsinszky and Belarusian qualifier Olga Govortsova tackles American 21st seed Madison Keys.

The men’s bottom-half matchups, which were determined on Saturday include seven-time champion Roger Federer against Spanish 20th seed Roberto Bautista Agut, 2013 champion Andy Murray against Croatian giant Ivo Karlovic, Viktor Troicki against Vasek Pospisil, who beat British wildcard James Ward 6-4, 3-6, 2-6, 6-3, 8-6, and 2010 runner-up Tomas Berdych against 12th seed Gilles Simon.

Simon beat fellow Frenchman Gael Monfils 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (8-6), 2-6, 6-2 in a match that was moved under the roof at Centre Court as darkness arrived while Berdych, the Czech sixth seed, saw off Spain’s Pablo Andujar 4-6, 6-0, 6-3, 7-6 (7-3).

To the locals’ delight, Murray beat 25th seed Andreas Seppi of Italy 6-2, 6-2, 1-6, 6-1 while Karlovic hurled down 41 aces in a 7-6 (7-3), 4-6, 7-6 (7-2), 7-6 (11-9) win over French 13th seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

Murray, the world number three, required a medical time-out for treatment on his right shoulder after dropping the first game of the fourth set but then reeled off six games in succession.

“The shoulder is fine. The trainer came out and manipulated my back. He gave it a few good cracks,” said Murray. “It’s a 90-kilo guy lying on top of me so it’s not that pleasant. He said the shoulder was like a machine gun going off when he laid on top of me.”

However, it was Kvitova’s sensational demise that appeared to flummox everyone.

No one saw the defeat coming after Kvitova had whipped her first two opponents for the loss of just three games in total.

But Jankovic produced the kind of shots not seen from her racket since she ruled tennis all those years ago and stormed back from a set and 4-2 down to pull off the most improbable of victories when Kvitova whacked a backhand into the net.

“Not to be in the second week of [my] favourite tournament ... is really sad,” Kvitova said. “I don’t really know what I can say.”

In the men’s doubles event, Pakistan’s Aisam-ul-Haq and his partner Gilles Muller of Luxembourg crashed out in the second round, losing 6-7 (11-9), 7-6 (7-4), 6-4, 6-4 to the 10th-seeded French duo of Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut.

Published in Dawn, July 6th, 2015

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