Taiwanese sisters Chan Hao-ching and Chan Yung-jan crashed out of the quarter-finals of the women’s doubles at the US Open on Tuesday, despite taking a 5-0 lead in the first set at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York.
The ninth seeds fell to a 7-6 (7/5), 6-1 defeat to top seeds Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza in 1 hour, 25 minutes at Louis Armstrong Stadium in Flushing Meadows, losing 13 of the final 15 games contested.
The Chan sisters failed to save any of four break points, while converting two of four, but it was not enough as their Swiss-Indian opponents rallied from a slow start to hit 25 winners and take 70 of the 121 points contested to advance to a semi-final against 11th-seeded Italian duo Sara Errani and Flavia Pennetta, who defeated 15th seeds Lara Arruabarrena of Spain and Andreja Klepac of Slovenia 6-0, 5-7, 6-2.
“At 5-0, all I said was: ‘Let’s just get two games and try to get some rhythm for the second set,’ and before we knew it, we were 5-5,” Mirza told the WTA Tour Web site. “I think tennis is an amazing sport. It gives you so many chances; it takes away so many chances, too. We played a couple of big points at 5-3 to break her. At 30-all I made one return winner, [Martina] made one return winner and that was it.”
“We know they’re [the Chan sisters] great opponents and I think definitely whoever wins this match deserves it,” Hingis said. “We’ve had matches like that against them, that we were down, and fought back and were able to win. That’s why, even try to get on board in the first set and it just kept clicking. Sania kept me alive in the first set; everything was happening so fast.”
The defeat ended Chan Hao-ching’s US Open campaign, but elder sister Chan Yung-jan had a chance to gain some revenge on the Swiss former world No. 1 yesterday when she was due to team up with Rohan Bopanna and take on Hingis and Leander Paes in the semi-finals of the mixed doubles.
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