American McCartney Kessler rallied in front of a friendly crowd on Wednesday, pulling off a 3-6, 6-4, 6-2 upset of No. 4 seed Xinyu Wang of China in the second round of Tennis in the Land in Cleveland.
Kessler had never defeated a top-50 opponent in her career before taking down Wang, who coughed up a 2-0 lead in the second set. Kessler also put together a strong finish, winning the final four games of the third set after Wang drew even at 2.
Despite losing, Wang still managed to finish with more aces (5-4) and fewer double faults (4-3).
The Netherlands’ Arantxa Rus also knocked off a seeded foe, beating Bulgarian seventh seed Viktoriya Tomova 6-3, 6-3. Top seed Beatriz Haddad Maia of Brazil, No. 3 seed Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic and Russian Anastasia Potapova, the No. 5 seed, all warded off upsets.
Romania’s Ana Bogdan also prevailed, and two more matches were scheduled for later Wednesday.
Abierto GNP Seguros
No. 7 seed Yue Yuan of China cruised to a 6-4, 6-1 win over Croatian Petra Martic in second-round action in Monterrey, Mexico.
Yuan finished with just one ace to Martic’s five but saved 4 of 6 break points and converted 5 of 6.
The meeting between Yuan and Martic was just the beginning of the slate Wednesday, as there were five more matches to come.
–Field Level Media
