Third round for win for Routliffe, Dabrowski in Melbourne

Erin Routliffe and Gaby Dabrowski have continued their march through the draw at the Australian Open, with a 6-7(5) 6-3 6-4 third round victory over Laura Siegemund from Germany and Brazil’s Beatriz Haddad Maia

The victory over the No 15 seeds, which took two and a half hours to complete, continues Routliffe and Dabrowski’s streak of reaching at least the quarterfinals of every grand slam they’ve played in.

As in their first two matches at Melbourne Park, Routliffe and Dabrowski had to fight their way back after losing the opening set, but it did look like they were going to be able to buck that trend this time.

Siegemund was broken in the third game of the match and Dabrowski was able to consolidate it in the next.

However, Dabrowski fell behind 15-40 when serving for the set. The first break point was saved, but on the second the Canadian put too much on a lob and the ball went out.

At 2-2 in the tiebreak, Routliffe was troubled by the sun, restarting her motion after each serve and double faulted.

They were down 4-2 at the change of ends and on set point at 6-5 Dabrowski put a volley into the net when stretching to her right. 

Siegemund was broken twice in the first five games of the second set, while Dabrowski was broken once. 

But the German was broken once more at 3-5 to send the match to a deciding set. 

Haddad Maia was unable to hold serve early in the second set, but Dabrowski was broken to love in the following game.

The drama then built, before Haddad Maia got in trouble when serving at 4-5.

At 15-30 Dabrowski smoked a backhand return down the line and on the next point, match point, she put away a volley at the net, directing the ball to Siegemund’s feet.

Speaking on court afterwards, Routliffe said she hadn’t been happy with her serve during the first two rounds, but felt it improved for this match.

“I'm happy with my serve today,” Routliffe said. 

“I've been struggling a little bit with my serve, but I'm glad that I got the rhythm on it today and was able to improve from our other matches, because that's the goal.”

Dabrowski said she was able to improve her serve over the match, which she believed helped them over the last two sets. 

“I think I served a little bit better (after the first set), the sun was really tricky,” Dabrowski said.

“Luckily, it moved a little bit to the left, and then I could see a bit better. 

“So my serve speed went up and that helped us hold a little bit easier. I think we stayed committed to being aggressive, even sometimes when it didn't work, it was still the right play and in the end it paid off.”

In the next round Routliffe and Dabrowski play against Miyu Kato from Japan and Mexico’s Renata Zarazua.

But before that Routliffe is back on court on Monday for a second round mixed doubles match with Michael Venus against Alexandra Panova and Lloyd Glasspool.