An injury-troubled Roberta Vinci has crashed out of the Connecticut Open after losing 7-6(9), 6-1, to Swedish lucky loser Johanna Larsson.
The quarter-final match was a tale of two halves for the second seed after pushing her lower ranked opponent to her limits throughout the opening set. Vinci recovered from a 0-3 deficit and then saved two set points to take first set to a tiebreaker, where she failed to capitalise on her own opportunities.
After narrowly losing the opening set, the US Open runner-up crumbled in the second set as Larsson dominated the remainder the match. Dramatically Vinci’s winning service percentage dropped from 59% to 22% between the two sets.
Vinci has attributed her lacklustre match performance to a lapse in concentration as well as foot issue that she has experienced since the Rio Olympics. During her media press conference, the world No.8 said that she is currently receiving treatment on a tendon on her left foot. Regardless of her injury troubles, Vinci is confident that she will be ready for the final grand slam of the season.
“I’m injured a little bit. I have a bit of pain on my left tendon. I had this kind of problem starting from Rio.” Vinci said.
“Now I have two or three days off before New York. I will try to recover and try to be better for the US (Open).” She later added.
Vinci is the second seed to crash out to Larsson. In the first round, the Swedish player also defeated Timea Bacsinszky in straight sets. The duo of wins has guided Larsson to her first WTA Premier semifinal at the age of 28.
In the last four, Larsson will play Elina Svitolina. The world No.23 experienced little difficulty during her dominating 6-3, 6-1, win over Russia’s Elena Vesnina. Svitolina will now play in her third semifinal of the year and her first since the Malaysia Open in March.
First @ConnecticutOpen Semifinal for @ElinaSvitolina! 👏 #CTOpen16 pic.twitter.com/6ENxobqtxy
— WTA (@WTA) 25 August 2016
The upcoming match will be the first meeting between Larsson and Svitolina on the WTA Tour. Neither player have ever reached the final at a WTA Premier level tournament or above.
