Eugenie Bouchard is only 23-years-old but she seems to have been around forever when it comes to the WTA professional tour. A fierce opponent and a WTA new superstar back in 2014, the young Canadian has now moved beyond the expectations demanded of her. Unfortunately, she failed to keep her head above water when it came to delivering high-quality tennis and eventually she saw her ranking plunging.
A former WTA No. 5, she is now ranked 70th in the world, which may be summed up as below average. With no recent extraordinary results under her belt, she received a wild-card for the Rogers Cup in Toronto which meant she missed playing in the qualifying stages.
Even so, her run in women's singles contest came to an end in the opening round. It's just another sad chapter in what should've been a success story.
Donna Vekic got past Bouchard in straight sets
In the opening round, Eugenie Bouchard faced Donna Vekic (51 WTA) who is another WTA hope for the future. The young Croatian Rising Star had to play in the qualifying round and eventually, those few extra matches got her some rhythm and control which she successfully used against a deflated Bouchard. Having a single previous meeting in their head to head pot (it went to Bouchard back in 2016 at Shenzhen), the outcome of this one was hard to predict.
Bouchard seemed to have the upper hand especially as she was playing in front of a supportive crowd.
At it turned out, it wasn't enough, as Vekic edged The Canadian in straight sets. The opening act saw the 21-year-old Croatian eager to put her nose in front. She raced to a comfortable lead and despite Bouchard's efforts, she capped the set by 6-3. The second part firstly had the home crowd's favorite getting in front with a break only to see her collapsing almost immediately after.
In the end, Vekic won the second set by 6-4 and booked a clash with the former world No. 1 Angelique Kerber of Germany.
Bouchard seems unable to gather any sort of momentum on her side
Three years ago, Eugenie was riding the wave, reaching two Grand Slam semis and the final at Wimbledon. It seems that nothing has survived from that particular year as she is now barely hanging on.
The loss against Vekic makes her 2017 numbers even worse as she is now 12-16 in win/ loss section.
She had only two decent results with seven months of the current season being done and dusted. Reaching the semis at in Sydney and the quarterfinals in Madrid are the highlights of her season. Any further argument seems useless.
