Andrea Petkovic on difference between playing Naomi Osaka, Serena Williams

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Former world No. 9 Andrea Petkovic says Naomi Osaka is an extremely difficult opponent to play on a good serving day and the German felt it on her own skin earlier this year in Melbourne. 

Osaka, a former world No. 1, saw off Petkovic 6-1 7-5 in the Melbourne Summer Set 1 quarterfinal. 

It was the third meeting between the two and Osaka's second win over Petkovic. 

Osaka beat a teenage Osaka in 2014 and that's her lone win over the Japanaese. 

"The only thing that I always hope when I play Naomi is that she doesn't make a lot of first service," Petkovic said on the Craig Shapiro podcast. "Then when you have a second serve and you can attack it a little bit, then you're there, you can at least play

"But if she sees the ball well and serves well and I've played her and Melbourne this year and the roof was closed. So she had like 70% first serves. It's almost impossible to break her then because she is just so much power coming in at you."

Petkovic on the difference between playing Osaka, Serena Williams 

Osaka is one of the most talented players on the tour and in the past she had been quite a lot compared to Williams. 

"With Serena one time because people like to compare them and I think Serena is a little bit underestimated in her all-court game." Petkovic said. "People think she's all power because she has this great serve but really when you place arena, okay, if she serves well, you don't have many looks on it.

"But if you get into a rally with Serena, she plays angles that people don't know, she can play slice, she can play high spin with her forehand. So she really has a lot of rap that she can use to play you, whereas with Naomi, it's pure power."

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2tDKyAv

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