Dinara Safina & Venus Williams Crash Out

1 month ago 29th Sep 12:01

Dinara Safina's poor second half of the season continues as she crashed out of the Tokyo Open in the second round to qualifier Chang Kai-Chen.

Safina, who was the defending champion, was given a bye into the second round but once again struggled with her form to notch up another unexpected loss.

Her poor run of recent form, and the fact that she is yet to win a Grand Slam, has raised questions to whether she deserves the world number one spot.

Speaking to the BBC after her match Safina said: "I had a lot of chances in the third set but I just let it go. The way I played the game at 5-4 was not right after her latest setback.

"It's so disappointing I didn't play the way I should have played. I never took her out of her comfort zone."

Chang is ranked at 132 in the world but took the game to the world number one as she pushed the opening set to a tie-break before sealing it 7-5.

But Safina, still struggling, fought back to claim the second. But she could close the match out and double faulted to drop her serve when trying to close the match in the third.

This swung the momentum into the favour of Chang who held her nerve to win 7-6 (7-5) 4-6 7-5 in two hours and forty four minutes.

It was a bad day for the seeds all round as Venus Williams was also sent packing by Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in straight sets.

It was the first time Williams, seeded two, had played since crashing out of the U.S. Open to Kim Clijsters, the eventual winner.

The Russian served for the opening set at 5-4 but Williams broke her and the set was pushed to a tie break.

But Pavlyuchenkova was fazed by the break and missed opportunity as she took the match to Williams to clinch the tie break 8-6.

The momentum was with her and she opened up a 3-1 lead in the second. After throwing away the chance to stretch that lead to 4-1 Williams pegged her back to 3-3 and it looked like the come back was on.

But in the twelfth game the Russian broke once again to go on an wrap up the second set winning the match 7-6 (8-6) 7-5.