WHAT HAPPENED: Simona Halep of Romania is back in the second week of a Grand Slam, with ease. Halep, No. 2 in the world, coasted past American qualifier Shelby Rogers, 6-2, 6-3, Saturday night in Arthur Ashe Stadium.
The routine win took just 67 minutes.
“I’m really happy with my game tonight,” Halep said on court after the match.
The third-round contest was all Halep. In the first set, she broke Rogers twice and won 11 of the 12 times she landed her first serve. Rogers, on the other hand, won just 53 percent of her first-serve points in the first set.
During the second set, Rogers tripled the number of unforced errors she hit, 18, compared to her winners, 6.
Halep did not dominate. She hit only 57 percent of her first serves and struck 12 winners compared to nine unforced errors. But a less-than-perfect performance was good enough for Halep on Saturday.
Ranked in the Top 4 all this year, Halep has struggled to bring her best game to tennis’ biggest tournaments. She made the quarterfinals in Australia but lost in the second and first round at the French Open and at Wimbledon, respectively.
She’s through to the fourth round in New York for the first time since 2013.
Rogers had good moments. She held to start the match, and she broke Halep when the Romanian tried to serve for it. Rogers, ranked No. 154, had won five consecutive matches by qualifying and making the third round of the Open. It was her best result at any Grand Slam.
WHAT IT MEANS: Halep gets off the court quickly, again. Her first-round opponent, Marina Erakovic of New Zealand, retired after 11 games. Halep won her second-round match against Kateryna Bondarenko of Ukraine in straight sets as well.
By advancing, Halep, who lost to Serena Williams in the Cincinnati final, keeps alive the chance of a rematch in next weekend’s US Open final.
In the fourth round, Halep will play Barbora Strycova of Czech Republic or No. 24 seed Sabine Lisicki of Germany.
THE QUESTION: What should Halep do differently if she plays Williams in the final?
