Reuters
Singapore, Oct 29: Maria Sharapova made light of her long injury lay-off by advancing to the last four of the WTA Finals with an unbeaten record in round-robin play after the Russian breezed past Flavia Pennetta 7-5, 6-1 here Thursday.
The victory also ended the career of the 33-year-old Italian, who announced this season would be her last after her stunning US Open victory last month, and booked a surprise passage to the semifinals for Agnieszka Radwanska.
Radwanska had earlier battled past Simona Halep 7-6 (7-5), 6-1 in their last Red Group match, with the Pole just two points away from elimination at one stage and only able to progress if Sharapova beat Pennetta in straight sets.
Pennetta started well breaking Sharapova in the first game of the match. But she could not maintain the momentum as the Russian broke back in the eighth game. From then on it was a one-way traffic. Sharapova broke the Italian again in the 12th game and the first set was hers. The second set was a tame affair with Pennetta committing silly errors.
Radwanska had lost her first two matches and few would have given the fifth seed a chance of upsetting Halep, the highest-ranked player in the tournament.
The Romanian broke Radwanska in the first game of the match and even led 5-1 in the first set tie-break. But she couldn’t close it out and as the match progressed, Radwanska prospered to stun the top seed.