Linz (Austria), Nov 10: The latest tennis sensation and US Open champion from Great Britain, Emma Raducanu’s string of poor performances continued with the 18-year-old losing to qualifier Wang Xinyu of China 6-1, 6-7(0), 7-5 in the second round of the Upper Austria Ladies Linz here.
Xinyu earned her first top-20 win, stunning the No.1 seed Raducanu in a late Tuesday evening game, while second seed Simona Halep of Romania reversed a recent loss to Aliaksandra Sasnovich of Belarus to reach the quarterfinals.
World No.106 Wang needed 2 hours and 36 minutes to knock off this year’s most recent Grand Slam champion, and the 20-year-old from Shenzhen, China edged closer to potentially making her top-100 debut on the WTA. “I really felt the passion here,” Wang said after her triumph.
Coming into Linz, Wang had played top-20 opposition for the first four times in her career this season, and she was unable to win a set in any of those clashes. But with Raducanu having just hit her new career-high ranking of world No.20 in this week’s singles rankings, Wang was able to capture her first top-20 victory in Linz.
Last month, Raducanu was brought crashing down to earth in her first tournament since her US Open triumph, losing in straight sets to Aliaksandra Sasnovich in the second round of the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells. It had ended her 10-match winning streak that began in New York.
No.2 seed Halep got her Upper Austria Ladies Linz campaign off to a satisfying start, taking revenge on Aliaksandra Sasnovich in a top-notch 7-5, 6-3 second-round win. Sasnovich had defeated Halep 7-5, 6-4 in the third round of Indian Wells one month ago. (IANS)
