In her first match since the Australian Open, Eugenie Bouchard escapes a first-round upset loss in Doha

The most noteworthy takeaway from Genie Bouchard’s first-round victory at the big WTA Tour event in Doha Sunday evening was that … she won it.

The why, and the how – and “how not” by opponent Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia – are details best left in the past after the Canadian pulled out a 5-7, 6-3, 7-6 (4) win that took nearly 2 1/2 hours and required her to save two match points.

That, of course, was Bouchard’s choice. She could have played matches at Fed Cup in Quebec City, and then in a tournament she entered down in Rio de Janeiro this week to capitalize on the positive momentum generated during her Australian tour last month.

Instead, she chose to practice and train.

It might have ended up paying off in this one on the endurance side; Bouchard’s energy level and foot speed looked on point even towards the end of Sunday’s gruelling, nerve-wracking match. But in terms of match play, the month-long break definitely contributed to some rust.

In some ways, it was almost as though she had to start from scratch after all the positive developments in Australia. Down there, in her first real baby steps after a difficult 2015 season that ended prematurely after her well-documented accident at the US Open, she showed off a first serve that was relatively hitch-free and trending upward on the velocity. She also hit her down the line backhand well, and her forward-thinking play heralded a return to her best moments, when she approached the net astutely and volleyed competently.

Against Sevastova, those steps forward were seemingly erased although by the end of the match, she was moving forward and looking confident on the bold forehand swing volley. There were serious toss issues on the first serve, and she didn’t seem to make many of them in the key moments.

On the positive side, Bouchard was aggressive with her second serve, using a kick serve out wide to the shorter Sevastova’s two-handed backhand that worked well. For the most part, she also kept her cool rather admirably despite all the errors.

And after she managed to hold at 5-6 in the third set, in a 12-minute game that featured seven deuces and two match points against her, Bouchard played a very composed, confident-looking tiebreak.

But in the end, the match truly was on Sevastova’s racquet. Given Bouchard was by far the more aggressive player of the two, that’s not what needs to happen in this sort of matchup.

Nearly four years older than Bouchard but still only 25, Sevastova has had an interesting career. She played just four junior tournaments (all Grade 5, the lowest level), none after age 15 and only one outside of Latvia.

She didn’t even take tennis seriously until then but once she hit the pros, she rose quickly.

As Bouchard was making her move up the rankings in the second half of 2013 and all of 2014, Sevastova was legitimately retired, studying leisure management after she suddenly stopped following a first-round loss in Miami in March 2013.

Sevastova applied for reinstatement into the International Tennis Federation’s drug testing program at the end of 2014 and began her comeback, unranked, at tiny $10,000 tournaments the following February.

By the end of 2015 she was already just outside the top 100; when she qualified at the Australian Open last month and won her first-round match in the main draw, it was her first Grand Slam-level match win in five full years – since she reached the fourth round of the 2011 Australian Open and subsequently a career-high ranking of No. 36.

So Bouchard likely had no idea who she was, and when Sevastova changed the pace on the ball, used her slice to neutralize the Canadian’s attack, and created wide angles out of balls hit down the middle that had Bouchard lunging and flailing, she had little idea how to handle it at first.

But she fought and Sevastova couldn’t hold her nerve. She played an appalling second set and, after leading Bouchard 4-0 in the third, was broken at love and looked for all the world on the changeover as though she were down 1-4 instead of ahead.

She was often more aggressive on Bouchard’s first serve than her second, putting little pressure on a delivery that, in the past, has let the Canadian down. That had to be a confidence boost for Bouchard, perhaps one reason why she did such a good job with that second serve at key moments.

And then, she got a bit of luck.

At 15-30, serving for the match at 5-3, Sevastova thought she had an ace. The Hawkeye system said otherwise, and Sevastova airmailed her second serve long. Bouchard broke.

At 5-6 on Bouchard’s serve, on Sevastova’s first match point, she crushed a first-serve return right on the line that Bouchard could barely handle. The ball was called out; the review proved that call inaccurate. But because Bouchard had made contact, the point was replayed – and she hit a clutch second-serve with a huge kick that saved her.

In that game, Sevastova failed to put returns in play on serves that came floating in at 143 km/hour (a first serve) and even slower.

In the tiebreak, given second life, Bouchard rose to the occasion while her opponent crumbled.

A narrow escape. But in the end, half of tennis is hanging in there even when things don’t look good.

She will meet the winner of match between Elina Svitolina of Ukraine and Denisa Allertova of the Czech Republic in the second round.

(Screengrabs from TennisTV.com)