September 24, 2007	Monday	Ramazan 11, 1428

BEIJING, Sept 23: Lindsay Davenport tasted defeat for the first time in a year on Saturday, losing 6-3, 7-5 to second seed Jelena Jankovic in the China Open semi-finals.

World number three Jankovic will be chasing her fifth title of the season in Sunday’s final with Hungarian sixth seed Agnes Szavay, who silenced a partisan home crowd by crushing China’s Peng Shuai 6-1, 6-2.

Jankovic was a break down in both sets but Davenport made 20 unforced errors in the 1-1/2 hour contest and the Serb battled back to beat the American for the first time.

It also avenged a defeat by the former world number one in Bali last week.

Davenport had won eight successive matches and last week’s Bali tournament on her return to tennis after a year in retirement, and just three months after giving birth to her son.

The match became a little bad-tempered late in the second set when Davenport complained to the umpire after being hit by a ball Jankovic had tossed high into the air in frustration.

Local hope Peng had beaten Martina Hingis and Amelie Mauresmo on her way to a second successive semi-final here but Szavay put her under pressure from the start.

The Hungarian teenager, who reached the US Open quarter-finals earlier this month, broke in 21-year-old Peng’s first service game and wrapped up the first set in less than half an hour when the Chinese double faulted.

Peng had come from a set down against Mauresmo but, perhaps because of the strain of reaching the semi-final in singles and doubles, found no way back in an equally one-sided second set.

UPSET WIN

KOLKATA: Russian Maria Kirilenko beat second seed Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia 4-6, 6-2, 6-1 to reach her first WTA final at the Kolkata Open on Saturday.

Fourth seed Kirilenko will face unseeded Mariya Koryttseva on Sunday after the Ukrainian overcame Briton Anne Keothavong 7-6, 6-3 in the first semi-final as she also bids for her first WTA title in the indoor tournament.

Hantuchova, the 24-year-old world number 11 who had won three previous meetings with Kirilenko, began well before the 35th-ranked Russian repeatedly put pressure on her serve.

However, she pounced on a Kirilenko double-fault to break her serve in the ninth game before serving out for the set.

Kirilenko produced many crisp down-the-line winners and sharp forehand shots to race to 5-1 before claiming the second set with a backhand winner and then twice broke the serve of a struggling Hantuchova to wrap up the decider.—Reuters