Okutoyi begins US Open Doubles quest with comfortable victory

Kenya’s 18-year-old tennis history maker Angella Okutoyi got her quest for the US Open Girls’ Doubles title off to the perfect start as she advanced to Round 2 of the Grand Slam tournament following a comfortable opening win in the first round alongside her Dutch partner Rose Marie Nijkamp on Wednesday night.

With the two players having formed the winning partnership back in July to clinch the Wimbledon Girls’ Doubles title, which made Okutoyi become the first Kenyan player to ever win a Grand slam tournament in history, the pair were hoping to replicate the feat once again in the US Open hard courts.

Tennis sensation Angella Okutoyi writes history after making Wimbledon finale

Up against Qavia Lopez (USA) and Johanne Christine Svendsen (Denmark) in Round 1, the pair showed good form as they only needed fifty minutes to wrap the straight set 6-1, 6-3 win.

The first set only took eighteen minutes as Okutoyi and Nijkamp broke their opponents thrice to put themselves in the driving seat with the 6-1 lead.

Svendsen and Lopez tried to fight back in the second set with a break of their own in the third game but is was not to be as they relinquished their advantage when Okutoyi/Nijkamp drew back level in the sixth game.

With momentum on their side, the Wimbledon champions piled even more pressure as they broke once again to go 5-3 up in the second set before serving out the match in a second set that took 32 minutes.

Following the victory, the two will face USA pair Natalie Block and Piper Charney in the second round for a chance of reaching the quarter finals.

Angella Okutoyi – Tennis barrier breaker who rose from a children's orphanage to the Grand Slam