Clijsters breezes past Sprem

Kim Clijsters
12 April 2012

Kim Clijsters made light work of her fifth consecutive win against the dangerous Karolina Sprem as she edged closer to an all-Belgian clash with Justine Henin.

The eighth seed, who is making her first Wimbledon appearance for four years, gained a routine 6-3 6-2 victory in the first match on Court One to book her place in the third round of the women's singles.

The former world number one will next play either American Shenay Perry or 28th seed Maria Kirilenko, of Russia, with Henin almost certainly lying in wait in the fourth round after gaining a 6-3 7-5 victory over Kristina Barrois, of Germany, earlier on Wednesday.

Clijsters had won all four previous clashes with the Croatian in straight sets, conceding just 14 games in the process, and little has clearly changed since their last meeting in 2005.

The Belgian number one has unfinished business at Wimbledon, where her best achievement has been two semi-final appearances, and she looks in the mood to add to her US Open victory in her comeback year last August.

Sprem, who famously beat Venus Williams to reach the quarter-finals in 2004, promised to provide stern opposition but faded badly after a promising opening.

For the most part the pair traded shots from the baseline, with Clijsters pulling out the big points when it mattered.

She was forced to save three break points in her opening service game but broke her opponent in the fourth game and closed out the first set in 33 minutes.

The Croatian put her big serve to use to win a marathon opening game in the second set but she lacked the consistency of her more experienced opponent and was broken in the third game.

The end came in sight when Clijsters broke her to love in the fifth and duly wrapped up the match in one hour and 13 minutes.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in