Now Clijsters Added to Injured List at WTA SydneyPosted on January 12, 2006 Kim Clijsters was added to the ever-growing pro tennis injury list Wednesday at the WTA stop in Sydney, with a problematic hip sidelining the Belgian while she was warming up for her quarterfinal encounter with Italy's Francesca Schiavone.
"It's not good," said Clijsters, who suffered from hip problems in 2005. "I could hardly walk up the stairs. It feels like it's really deep inside. I don't know what the injury is. I'll need to have some tests tomorrow...I hurt it warming up. I was hitting for about 20 minutes, just my groundstrokes, and I was feeling fine. Then all of a sudden I just started to do serves and as soon as I served I felt some really sharp pains. I tried to stretch it out a little bit and do some movements to loosen up my hip or and my back but it just kept getting worse and worse." Injury claimed another top player during the day when No. 4 seed Nadia Petrova handed a walkover to No. 5 Justine Henin-Hardenne, with the Russian unable to compete due to an adductor strain. Joining walkover beneficiaries Henin-Hardenne and Schiavone in the semifinals were winners (6) Svetlana Kuznetsova (d. Ivanovic) and (8) Nicole Vaidisova (d. Hantuchova who retired in the second set with illness). "The key was fighting, run every ball," said Kuznetsova, who trailed 4-5, 0-40 before capturing the first set. "I think here it was much harder to beat her because of the wind because it suits her game much more than mine because she plays flat." If you're still counting that's three of the four quarterfinal matches determined by injury or illness. "Injuries are a part of every sport," said WTA Tour CEO Larry Scott toward the end of 2005. "It is a bit of a fluke that so many players are injured at the same time, and I don't expect this to happen next summer." On court Thursday are (5) Henin-Hardenne vs. (6) Kuznetsova (H-H leads head-to-head 7-1), and (7) Schiavone vs. (8) Vaidisova. |
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