Cornet Knocks Off Kerber in Beijing
McHale Beats U.S. Open Champ Stephens
The China Open in Beijing got underway on Monday, and France’s Alize Cornet got her tournament off to a winning start by downing former world number one and 10th seed Angelique Kerber 6-4, 6-4.
“I am pretty happy about the way I played,” said Cornet. “It was a very consistent match. It’s never easy to play Angie, she’s a great player, a great fighter—I’m happy I got through.”
Cornet moves on to play the winner of Elise Mertens and Caroline Garcia.
Caroline Wozniacki powered her way into the Round of 16 with a 6-2, 6-2 win over fifth-seeded Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, setting up a matchup with the winner of American Varvara Lepchenko and Petra Kvitova.
Czech Republic’s Barbora Strycova knocked off top-seed and current world number one Garbine Muguruza, posting a 6-1, 2-0 lead before the Spaniard retired with an illness.
“It’s never easy to win this way,” said Strycova. “But it happened, I am in the second round. That is how it is and sometimes things happen that way. I just kept fighting and was happy I won those three games at the beginning because that was a turning point.”
Strycova will play Julia Goerges next.
U.S. Open champion Sloane Stephens fell to fellow American Christina McHale on Monday. The New Jersey-native rolled to a 6-3, 6-0 victory over Stephens.
“It’s definitely a big win for me,” said McHale. “I’m just really excited to be moving on to the next round here. I think Sloane wasn’t at her best today, but I served well, got a lot of balls back and returned well. I just stayed the course throughout the match.”
McHale draws Sorana Cirstea of Romania next.
