Tennis

No. 2 Halep latest big name to fall in Wuhan

Published Sep. 26, 2017 7:22 a.m. ET

WUHAN, China (AP) No. 2-ranked Simona Halep lost her opening match at the Wuhan Open, dismantled by Daria Kasatkina 6-2, 6-1 on Tuesday.

Halep received a bye into the second round. She broke Kasatkina early but the Russian dominated thereafter.

It was Kasatkina's third win over a top-five player, after two wins over then-No. 1 Angelique Kerber this year.

''The game was much more difficult than the score is,'' Kasatkina said.

Halep had a chance this week to supplant Garbine Muguruza as No. 1 by reaching the final with other results going her way.

No. 4 Karolina Pliskova kept alive her shot at No. 1 by beating local Shuai Zhang 6-4, 3-6, 6-4. To regain the No. 1 ranking, Pliskova must win the Wuhan title and hope Muguruza loses before the semifinals. Muguruza was in action late.

''I always want to play better than I did last year; I already won one round so hopefully I can win one more,'' Pliskova said.

Another Russian, two-time major champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, lost to Alize Cornet of France 6-3, 6-3.

Three other seeds advanced: No. 7 and 2016 finalist Dominika Cibulkova, No. 8 Jelena Ostapenko, and No. 9 Agnieszka Radwanska.

Ostapenko came back to beat Barbora Strycova 2-6, 7-5, 6-3, and Radwanska saw off Julia Goerges of Germany 7-5, 7-5.

Ekaterina Makarova of Russia, Caroline Garcia of France, Wang Qiang of China, and Varvara Lepchenko of the U.S. were also winners on Tuesday.

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