Top junior seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, has been bundled out by sixth seeded Urszula Radwanska of Poland, 7-5, 6-1 in the quarter-finals of the girls’ singles. Radwanska – sister of 2005 girls’ champion Agnieszka – will now play British teenager Anna Fitzpatrick in the semi-finals.
Radwanska, a semi-finalist in the girls’ singles in 2006 and seeded sixth at this year’s event, was playing in her second match of the day after earlier beating Oxana Kalashnikova of Georgia 7-5, 6-1.
However, Pavlyuchenkova - world No. 1 junior and current US and Australian Open champion – had already won twice earlier in the day and was competing in her third clash in the space of seven hours. Perhaps inevitably, the Russian 16-year-old looked somewhat tired after clocking up successive victories over Dutch player Arantxa Rus 6-4, 6-1 and American teen Reka Zsilinszka 6-3, 6-2.
Under the blustery conditions on Court 9, the match got off to a fine start in a first-rate advertisement of junior tennis, with fascinating long rallies complemented by some excellent deep serving, crafty volleys and clever lobs.
Pavlyuchenkova made the first breakthrough in the seventh game to lead 4-3 after picking off Radwanska’s serve with some fine returns. However, heavy legs kicked in and her opponent reeled off four games in a row to seal a one set advantage 7-5 in a little over an hour.
After putting so much into the first set, Pavlyuchenkova appeared to have finally run out of steam. Radwanska quickly opened up a 5-0 lead after driving deep groundstrokes into the corners of the court and picking off some fine winners as Pavlyuchenkova’s shots frequently dropped short.
Pavlyuchenkova managed to peg back one game however it was all in vain as Radwanska sealed her spot in the semi-finals when Pavlyuchenkova lofted a backhand long and wide.
Pavlyuchenkova and Radwanska teamed up later in the day in the first round of the girls’ doubles. They beat Alison Bai of Australia and Monica Gorny of South Africa 6-4, 6-3.
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