American hopefuls Sloane Stephens, Taylor Fritz and Frances Tiafoe reach Wimbledon second round after their matches were delayed by rain
Sloane Stephens got the ball rolling for the American Wimbledon hopefuls on Wednesday when she sealed a 6-2, 6-3 victory over Rebecca Peterson to advance to the second round.
The 2017 US Open champion had to wait a day to get her SW19 campaign off and running but her appearance in the next round didn’t come under any threat.
Stephens, from Florida, came through in straight sets on Court 14 to set up a second-round match with No. 20 seed Donna Vekic on Thursday.
World No. 9 Taylor Fritz, whose girlfriend Morgan Riddle, 25, is also working at Wimbledon, finally finished off his marathon first round-match from Monday.
He secured a 6-4, 2-6, 4-6, 7-5, 6-3 win over unseeded German Yannick Hanfmann to set up a clash with Mikael Ymer next.
Sloane Stephens advanced to the second round of Wimbledon after sealing a 6-2, 6-3 victory
The American had to wait until Wednesday to get her Wimbledon campaign off and running
World No. 9 Taylor Fritz finally finished off his marathon first round-match from Monday
The grass-court, two-week Grand Slam tournament is already playing catch-up after rain delays.
Stephens was among 10 players who originally were on Monday’s schedule but had not played a point at the year’s third Grand Slam tournament until Wednesday.
Tenth seed Frances Tiafoe then overcame Yibing Wu 7-6 (7-4), 6-3, 6-4 after the Chinese tennis star reportedly collapsed during his Wimbledon opener.
Tenth seed Frances Tiafoe then overcame Yibing Wu 7-6 (7-4), 6-3, 6-4 on Wednesday
Chinese tennis star Yibing Wu reportedly collapsed during his Wimbledon opener against Tiafoe after complaining of breathing difficulty
Wu, ranked No. 62 in the ATP world rankings, was beaten in the opening set by Tiafoe on a tiebreak and had just lost the first two games of the second set before complaining of breathing difficulty.
After being checked over by medics on court, the 23-year-old was taken to the dressing room for an initial three-minute time-out, which was eventually extended to 15 minutes.
And according to ESPN, via The Sun, the extended break came after Wu fainted while back in the dressing room.
Fortunately he appeared to make a full recovery during that time, meaning he was able to return to court and continue the match shortly after.
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