Sabalenka sails into week two at Roland Garros

Aryna Sabalenka played another great match at Roland Garros (French Open) taking down Kamila Rakhimova in straight sets 6-2 6-2.

The match itself for the most part went largely as expected as Sabalenka impose her will pretty early on. There are very few tennis players that are capable of staying in a rally with Sabalenka when it comes to sheer power. Even some of the cleanest hitters on the Tour like Swiatek can't really stay with Sabalenka that easily.

Rakhimova certainly couldn't for much of this set but she found ways to trouble Sabalenka at times baiting her in longer rallies to rush a bit and Sabalenka did. A big bonus that worked for Sabalenka was her serve as it was able to wiggle her out of more than a few tricky situations. Rakhimova for the most part struggled to return well.

Even for her standards, Sabalenka brought a lot of power to this matchup. It happened right from the start as she hit each shot with full force not even thinking about letting up. She blasted 10 winners in the first set en route to a 6-2 finish and added even more in the second set. Rakhvimova pushed her a bit more in the second set which forced her to bring even more power to rallies.

Every rally finished on her own terms as Rakhimova wasn't able to generate the necessary power to hit through her opponent with the final score being 6-2 6-3. Just a really solid performance from the Belarussian who is in the second week of Roland Garros for the first time in her career. Pretty crazy when you think about it but she's had trouble on clay in the past. Six aces and 27 winners in the straight sets win. Very good stuff.