Top seed and world No. 1 Jelena Jankovic had her 12-match winning streak ended when she was defeated 5-7, 6-3, 6-3 by Italy’s Flavia Pennetta in the second round of the Zurich Open on Thursday.
The Serb looked weary against an aggressive and persistent opponent.
Pennetta’s deep groundstrokes and constant pressure paid dividends to produce her first win over Jankovic in six meetings.
Her win comes just a week after Jankovic won their Moscow quarter-final in straight sets.
“I was mentally and physically tired today, especially physically,” Jankovic said. “I’m not a machine. I’ve played a lot of matches, a lot of time changes, different finals, and I’m human.”
The match remained finely balanced throughout, with Pennetta looking increasingly sharp but Jankovic showing her usual resilience under pressure.
Jankovic earned the first break of the match to lead 3-1, but Pennetta broke back and then leveled at 4-4.
Her effort proved to be in vain however when, with Jankovic leading 6-5, the Italian double-faulted on break point to concede the set.
The disappointment spurred Pennetta, as she broke twice in the second set to lead 4-1.
Jankovic recovered one break in the sixth game, but Pennetta went on to break a third time to level the match at one set all. Both players held break points in the final set, before Pennetta made the vital breakthrough when leading 4-3.
A winning backhand return down the line off a second serve gave her a break for 5-3, and she closed out the match in the next game in dramatic fashion, as her ace was called out but then over-ruled by the umpire as good.
Second seed Ana Ivanovic, who had managed to win just five matches since lifting the French Open trophy in June, defeated Marion Bartoli of France 6-2, 6-4.
Ivanovic rallied powerfully and easily overcame any brief threats from her struggling opponent.
Agnieszka Radwanska’s hopes of qualifying for next month’s Sony Ericsson Championships were dealt a blow when the Polish fifth seed was beaten 2-6, 7-6 (8/6), 6-3 by Slovenia’s Katarina Srebotnik.
Fourth seeded Russian Vera Zvonareva was forced to retire because of illness when she was down 6-3, 3-0 against Spain’s Anabel Medina Garrigues.
In other second round matches, Victoria Azarenka of Belarus crushed Romanian Monica Niculescu 6-0, 6-0, and Czech Petra Kvitova beat Sofia Arvidsson of Sweden 6-2, 6-1.
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