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Bondarenko Ousts Seeded Vesnina at WTA Tashkent
Posted on October 5, 2006
TASHKENT, Uzbekistan -- Winning seems to be contagious in the Bondarenko family. A few days after older sister Alona collected her first Sony Ericsson WTA Tour singles title at Luxembourg, Kateryna Bondarenko upset No.2 seed Elena Vesnina, 36 64 64, on Wednesday to enter the Tashkent Open 2006 quarterfinals. It was her first win over Vesnina in three meetings.
"I was lucky," said Bondarenko, who also reached the quarterfinals here last year and next faces 2000 Tashkent champion Iroda Tulyaganova.
Vesnina showed no improvement from her first round, when she needed three sets to beat Chinese qualifier Sun Shengnan. Her serve, which helped her on Tuesday, was shaky on Wednesday.
"I did not feel confident at all," Vesnina said. "I knew it was going to be a tough match. Kateryna was playing well, she's a good player."
Vesnina's lack of confidence was apparent from the start. When serving for the first set, she was up 40-love but allowed the game to slip to deuce before finally winning it. Again, in the third set, she held a 40-love lead, but committed a string of errors and lost her serve and the match. Bondarenko won it on her first match point when Vesnina sent a backhand long.
Top seed Maria Elena Camerin, No.8 Anastassia Rodionova and hometown favorite Tulyaganova also advanced to the quarterfinals, while No.3 Sania Mirza of India and No.6 Olga Poutchkova of Russia got past their first round opponents.
Camerin had no problems in a 61 63 victory over Alla Kudryavtseva. Her quarterfinal foe is either Victoria Azarenka or Dominika Cibulkova.
"She missed a lot," Camerin said. "She can play much better, maybe she was nervous," said Camerin about Kudryavtseva, whom she beat in Bangalore earlier this year.
Rodionova had to play her second three-setter in as many days. Lucky loser Ekaterina Dzehalevich, a 20-year-old from Belarus, showed lots of resistance before going down, 64 46 63.
Tulyaganova, dressed in a shimmering blue outfit, defeated Tour veteran Tamarine Tanasugarn, 64 61, in a scrappy match. The first set, which featured seven breaks of serve, lasted 40 minutes. But the match became less competitive after Tanasugarn took a medical timeout after the third game of the second set. She returned with a strapped left ankle but it didn't help much as she didn't win another game.
Mirza had no trouble against Pauline Pamentier in a routine 63 61 win but Poutchkova was taken to three sets by Lioudmila Skavronskaia, winning 67(4) 62 75. Poutchkova had a set point in the ninth game of the first set but couldn't convert.
China's Sun Tiantian overcame lucky loser Mariya Koryttseva of Ukraine, 57 61 62, in two hours, 40 minutes.
-- WTA
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