Shenzhen, China (SportsNetwork.com) – Top seeds Simona Halep and Petra
Kvitova won their season-opening matches Monday at the Shenzhen Open tennis
tournament.
The world No. 3 French Open runner-up Halep came back to beat German Annika
Beck 4-6, 6-4, 6-3, while the left-handed Wimbledon champion and fourth-ranked
Kvitova clipped Chinese wild card Duan Ying-Ying 6-3, 6-1 on the hardcourts at
Shenzhen Loonggang Tennis Centre.
A bevy of upsets occurred when former Wimbledon runner-up Vera Zvonareva
took out third-seeded Chinese favorite Peng Shuai 4-6, 6-4, 6-3, Czech
Katerina Siniakova bested sixth-seeded Romanian Irina-Camelia Begu 6-7 (5-7),
6-4, 6-1 and Slovenian Polona Hercog handled seventh-seeded Romanian Monica
Niculescu 6-1, 7-5.
Li Na beat Peng in last year’s all-Chinese finale.
Some other opening-round wins came for Italian Karin Knapp and Serbian Bojana
Jovanovski, who should have her hands full with Kvitova in a second-round
affair here on Tuesday.
Shenzhen serves as a tune-up for the Australian Open, which will begin January
19 in Melbourne.
