Serena falls to Li Na in seesaw match

STUTTGART, Germany: China's Li Na claimed a famous scalp on Wednesday when she defeated world No 1 Serena Williams 0-6, 6-1, 6-4 here at the WTA tournament and pretty much cost the powerfully-built American her top world ranking.

In a dramatic match which see-sawed several times, Li rallied, having been totally overwhelmed in the first set to put Williams under immense pressure.

"I was very nervous in the first set and I just didn't have a chance," said Li, who lost to Russia's Dinara Safina in the Olympic Games semifinals having beaten Serena's sister Venus in the quarterfinals.

"I told myself: 'Come on, it's only been 20 minutes - you could still win this after an hour'.

"I knew I just had to hang in there."

Williams started the second round match with a hiss and a roar as she demolished Li 6-0 in just 21 minutes.

But despite being over-powered early on, the Chinese star replied by taking a 3-0 lead in the next set and used a strong base-line game to take the second 6-1 in just 28 minutes.

The game was delicately poised at 3-3 in the third when Williams missed her line shot and was broken by Li who extended her advantage to 5-3, but Williams defended three match points and held her serve to give herself a faint hope at 5-4 down.

Li had to defend a break point of her own before she hit her sixth ace of the game to win the match after one hour 35 minutes to reach the quarterfinals.

"I just started to make a lot of errors," admitted Williams afterwards.

"I pretty much gave it to her, it was like I said: 'Here you go, you have a win today'.

"Maybe I started to doubt myself, I made a lot of mistakes which helps her cause.

"She played really well, especially in the third set where she just fought for everything.

"I am disappointed I lost today (Wednesday), especially so soon in the tournament."

Williams now looks set to lose her No 1 ranking to nearest challenger Jelena Jankovic.

"To be quite honest I don't deserve it playing like that," said Williams.

"But I guarantee I will get it back."

Also joining Li in the quarterfinals is Olympic champion Elena Dementieva who needed just over an hour to beat Austria's Sybille Bammer 6-1, 6-4 in Wednesday night's second-round match.

Earlier, fifth-seed Svetlana Kuznetsova was a big-name casualty in the first round as she lost in three sets to Switzerland's Patty Schnyder.

The 'Swiss Miss' needed just over two hours to beat the 2004 US Open champion and this year's French Open semifinalist 6-4, 4-6, 7-5 to take her place in the second round.

Kuznetsova made a slow start and was quickly on the backfoot as Schnyder broke her early and served out the first set.

The Russian grew stronger and returned the favor in the second set to level the match, but Schnyder held her nerve.

Despite four aces from Kuznetsova in a tense and hard-fought final set, Schnyder broke the Russian, defended a break-point against her and then served out.

Schnyder, 29, ranked 11th in the world has had a successful season so far, reaching the last eight at both the US Open and the French Open.

She will meet another Russian, Nadia Petrova, in the second round.

The second seed of the day to tumble was Polish teenager Agnies Radwanska when the eighth seed lost to Bulgaria's Victoria Azarenka 6-1, 7-5 in the second round.

The 19-year-old will play either Olympic champion Elena Dementieva or Austria's Sybille Bammer in Friday's quarterfinals.

Beijing bronze medalist Vera Zvonareva was rarely troubled by Slovakia's Daniela Hantuchova as the seventh seed swept into the second round with a 6-3, 6-2 straight sets win in 78 minutes.

Zvonareva will play France's Marion Bartoli in the second round.

AFP

(China Daily 10/03/2008 page12)