Former No 1 Kerber suffers shock defeat at WTA Tour
Former women’s No 1, Angelique Kerber suffered a surprising elimination at the WTA Elite Trophy in China, as she was beaten by 21-year old Ashleigh Barty.
Barty, who is the youngest player in the draw, beat the more experienced Kerber 6-4, 6-3 to make the progress to the semifinal stage. She had also beaten Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the Rose group.
Reacting after the win, the Australian said: “It was tough group for me because I hadn’t actually beaten either of those girls.
“It’s nice to sort of get that revenge this week, but I felt like I served great all week and put myself in a good position in my service games to then be super-aggressive and nice and clear when returning so I can have a little bit more of a crack and see if I can get some of those early breaks in the sets.”
Meanwhile, Second-seeded CoCo Vandeweghe has also progressed to the semifinals of the same tournament. Vandeweghe beat Russia’s Elena Vesnina 6-3, 6-2 to progress.
Also qualifying to the semifinals is Anastasija Sevastova.
The tournament in Zhuhai features the leading players on the women’s tour who didn’t qualify for the WTA Finals in Singapore last week. The 12-player draw is divided into four groups of three, with the winner of each group advancing to the semifinals.
