Fifth seed Tadeja Majeric was the biggest casualty on Wednesday while hosts hope Kyra Shroff extended her run into the quarterfinals in the QNet $25000 ITF women’s tennis tournament here at the KSLTA courts.
Tadeja, after a tough three-set battle with unseeded Melis Sezer of Turkey, went down 5-7, 6-3, 6-7 (6-8). Well before that, Kyra reached the last-eight stage with a 6-3, 6-3 win over unseeded Nicole Clerico of Italy.
Apart from the Slovenian Tadeja, sixth seed Aleksandrina Naydenova of Bulgaria and seventh seed Sung-Hee Han of South Korea too exited in the last-16 stage with just four seeded players remaining among quarterfinalists.
Top seed Tamaryn Hendler of Belgium, second seed Akiko Omae of Japan, fourth seed Andrea Koch-Benvenuto of Chile and eighth seed Melanie Klaffner of Austria came unscathed to enter last eight.
Kyra, who failed to hold her serve in the fifth and seventh games, broke her rival in the second, sixth and eighth games to pocket the first set. In the second set, Nicole raised away to a 3-1 lead but Kyra then reeled off five games on the trot to wrap-up the match.
The 19-year-old faces qualifier Nungnadda Wannasuk of Thailand, who overcame Sung-Hee 6-2, 1-6, 6-2, in the quarters on Thursday.
Tamaryn got the better of unseeded Keren Shlomo 6-4, 6-1 in an hour and ten minutes encounter to set up a clash with Donna Vekic of Croatia, who upset Naydenova 6-4, 6-4.
Tamaryn, ranked 212, negotiated the big-serving Israeli with deep forehand and double-handed backhands. The set went on serve until 5-4 when Tamaryn gained three break-points and then converted the first of them with a deep return that her rival dumped into the net.
Tamaryn continued the momentum into the second set, going 2-0, by breaking the second game but Shlomo pulled one back immiediately to make it 2-1. Tamaryn held the next game, broke her opponent in the fourth and served well in the next game to quickly move to 5-1.
Results (prefix denotes seedings):
Pre-quarterfinals: 8-Melanie Klaffner (Aut) bt Jovana Jaksic (Srb) 6-3, 2-6, 6-0; Kyra Shroff (Ind) bt Nicole Clerico (Ita) 6-3, 6-3; Melis Sezer (Tur) bt 5-Tadeja Majeric (Slo) 7-5, 3-6, 7-6 (6); 4-Andrea Koch-Benvenuto (Chi) bt Anja Prislan (Slo) 7-5, 6-0; 1-Tamaryn Hendler (Bel) bt Keren Shlomo (Isr) 6-4, 6-1; Nungnadda Wannasuk (Tha) bt 7-Sung-Hee Han (Kor) 6-2, 1-6, 6-2; 2-Akiko Omae (Jpn) bt Ai Wen Zhu (Chn) 6-3, 6-3; Donna Vekic (Cro) bt 6-Aleksandrina Naydenova (Bul) 6-4, 6-4.
Doubles (quarterfinals): Rushmi Chakravarthi/ Ankita Raina (Ind) bt Martina Caciotti/ Agnese Zucchini (Ita) 7-6 (4), 6-3; Deniz Khazaniuk/ Ya Zhou (Isr/ Chn) bt Sung-Hee Han/ Keren Shlomo (Kor/ Isr) 7-5, 7-6 (4); Tamaryn Hendler/ Melanie Klaffner (Bel/ Aut) bt Tamara Curovic/ Rishika Sunkara (Srb/ Ind) 6-4, 6-4.
