Plucky Andrea Petkovic departs

Stuttgart. After Anna-Lena Grönefeld’s exit on Tuesday, Andrea Petkovic was the second home player to depart from the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix. A large crowd in the Porsche Arena watched the qualifier make Svetlana Kuznetsova, the world ranked No. 9 Russian, work hard for her win. After losing the first 6-4 set, the 21-year-old German came back strongly to take the second 7-5. In the third and final set, Svetlana Kuznetsova, the US Open winner in 2004, then took advantage of her greater experience to close out the match 6-1.

“More than anything else I feel disappointed at the moment,” said Andrea Petkovic after the match. “I wasn’t cool and experienced enough on the big points. I was pleased at being able to hold my own with Kuznetsova. She was defensively much better. I wasn’t really in control of my game in the third set and didn’t put her under enough pressure. I simply lost my focus. One good thing though is that I’m beginning to feel the benefits of all the work I’ve been doing on my fitness. My career is actually only just starting to take off.”

Andrea Petkovic broke into the world’s top 100 for the first time at the start of January 2008 when she was ranked 91st. She then suffered torn cruciate ligaments at the Australian Open and was only able to return to the game eight months later.

29/04/2009