Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Mixed fortunes for Sania Mirza at Kremlin Cup

The Gisela Dulko syndrome continued to haunt Sania Mirza as the Indian number one fell to her Argentinian nemesis in the first round of the Kremlin Cup on Tuesday.

The 6-3, 6-4 defeat at Moscow's Olympic Stadium was Mirza's third straight loss to Dulko in WTA tour meetings. And she hasn't been able to take a set off the 41st-ranked player yet.

Though Mirza had a better first serve percentage than Dulko at Moscow (63 to 58), she also committed nine doublefaults, which ultimately proved too costly in the 85-minute match.

The loss was Mirza's 18th out of a total of 48 matches on the WTA Tour this year.

Mirza had lost to Italy's Flavia Pennetta in the quarterfinals of the Japan Open last week in only her third match since the US Open.

But the 20-year-old had better luck in the evening at the Moscow doubles event, where she partnered Switzerland's Patty Schnyder to easily beat Vera Dushevina of Russia and Tatiana Perebiynis of Ukraine 6-1, 6-3 in less than an hour.

In the quarterfinals, Mirza and Schnyder will be pitted against top seeds Cara Black of Zimbabwe and Liezel Huber of the US.

There is hope yet as Mirza, ranked 20th in doubles, had beaten the world's best pair in the New Haven final in August - in partnership with Italy's Mara Santangelo.

No comments:

Post a Comment

MORE ON THE INDIAN TENNIS BLOG
For everything ever written on The Indian Tennis Blog, click here
For posts on Sania Mirza, click here
For posts on Leander Paes, click here
For posts on Somdev Devvarman, click here
For posts on Tara Iyer, click here
For posts on Mahesh Bhupathi, click here
For posts on Rohan Bopanna, click here
For posts on Prakash Amritraj, click here
For posts on Sunitha Rao, click here

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
With Somdev Devvarman (January 13, 2009 and October 4, 2007)

UPDATED ATP/WTA RANKINGS
Check upper-right corner of this blog

Popular Posts