Caroline Wozniacki clearly made the right choice to come out of retirement and try her hand at this tennis thing again, making it to the third round at the U.S. Open by beating two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova 7-5, 7-6 (5) on Wednesday night.
Wozniacki, a 33-year-old from Denmark, won the 2018 Australian Open and reached No. 1 in the rankings during her first stint on tour. She walked away from the sport in early 2020 to start a family and now she and her husband, former NBA player David Lee, are the parents of two children.
After a hiatus of 3 1/2 years, Wozniacki returned to competition this month and now is back at Flushing Meadows for the first time since 2019. She was the runner-up at the U.S. Open in 2009 and 2014.
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She looked quite capable of strong play against the 11th-seeded Kvitova on Wednesday night. There were some wobbles, including when Wozniacki held her first two match points at 5-4 in the second set and failed to convert either.
But her game was good enough to hang in there and pull out the tiebreaker.
When the match ended, Wozniacki sat in her sideline chair, leaned forward and covered her face with both hands. Then she leaned back, glanced over at her father and Lee in the stands, and smiled.