The end of the WTA season is quickly approaching and with the well-deserved holidays in sight, some players are struggling to find proper form during the last matches of their season.
We’ve already witnessed most of the seeds dropping out early in Linz last week, either due to injuries or poor on-court showings. Thankfully, injuries have so far played no major role on how the 2014 BGL BNP Paribas Luxembourg Open have unfolded, but not all seeds have delivered in terms of on-court performance this week.
Following yesterday’s early exit of #1 seed Andrea Petkovic, the tournament lost its second highest-seeded player today as Alize Cornet failed to make the quarterfinals, losing her match against Kiki Bertens in straight sets.
Another favorite player to pack it in is Monica Niculescu, the Romanian #8 seed fell prey to Mona Barthel. After Niculescu comfortably won the first set, the German picked up the pace as the Romanian started struggling with what seemed to be a neck injury.
While Mona Barthel turned her luck around, fellow German Sabine Lisicki was unable to make things go her way on Wednesday. Denisa Allertova, who played her way through the qualifying rounds, needed little more than an hour to end Lisicki’s season with a straight-set loss.
While the big names were struggling, several other players were determined to end their season on a high, including Varvara Lepchenko, Johanna Larsson, Annika Beck & Patricia Mayr-Achleitner, all of which won their respective matches today.
Mayr-Achleitner & Larsson arguably had the hardest road to get there, playing highly-emotional three-set battles after falling behind in the first set.
Mayr-Achleitner will face Annika Beck in the quarterfinals tomorrow and one of the two players is poised to end her season with what will be a WTA semifinal. Annika Beck is just two matches away from repeating her 2013 Luxembourg final.
With just two of the seeded players remaining in the draw, the 2014 edition of the BGL BNP Paribas Luxembourg Open will most likely have a surprise champion. Who will it be? Keep checking back to Women’s Tennis Blog to find out what happens next in Luxembourg!
Nice Photos! Thanks for posting.
bencic good tenist.