Wimbledon 2016 | Indian challenge ends at Wimbledon; SanTina, Paes-Hingis crash out
Defending champions Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis crashed out in the quarter-finals of the Wimbledon on Thursday losing to Timea Babos-Yaroslava Shvedova. The Swiss Miss also lost her third round match along with Leander Paes in the mixed doubles against Heather Watson and Henri Kontinen.
Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis were the favourites going into the match against 5th seeds Timea Babos and Yaroslava Shvedova in the last eight of the 2016 Wimbledon. The Hungarian-Yugoslavian combination threw the seedings out though and broke the World No.1 pair in the third game of the match to take a 2-1 lead. They served strongly to hold their lead and broke the Indo-Swiss pair again at 4-2 to go into their service game serving for the set. Babos-Shvedova had no trouble winning the game and set, closing itĀ out after drawing an unforced error from their opponents.
The fifth seeds looked to build on the confidence from the first set and started off strongly, breaking āSanTinaā right away, in the first game of the set. Keeping the game simple was working for them, and with 67% second serve points won, they were edging away into the semi-final. Mirza-Hingis looked set to make a comeback with a break with the set score 1-2 against them, but Babos and Shvedova held on. They went on to break their rivalās serve and held their own to take a 5-1 lead, virtually ending the match. The Australian Open champions completed a mini-comeback by winning three consecutive games, but it proved too little too late as Babos and Shvedova forced an error from them and won the match 6-2,6-4.
Hingis returned to court within a few hours looking to put behind the loss earlier in the day, and she, along with Paes, was up against Heather Watson of Britain and Henri Kontinen of Finland. She must certainly have been pleased with the start, after the Indo-Swiss pair held their serve and broke once to go 2-0 up. Long, intense battles continued in each game, and the French Open champions gifted a break with a double fault at 4-2. They fought back immediately to take the next break and serve, to win the set 6-3.
The second set began with both pairs fighting tooth and nail, before the unseeded British-Finnish combination broke Paes and HingisĀ to go ahead 4-2. They made no mistake thereafter, and closed out the set 6-3, with 83% wins on second serve and the six aces proving to be decisive. A similar pattern followed in the next set, with neck-to-neck games meaning the score was 2-2, before Watson-Kontinen broke their opponentsā serve. They tightened the screws further, breaking again, and holding their serve to run away with the set 6-2 and winning the match 3-6,6-3,6-2.
Paes had earlier lost in the second round of the menās doubles with partner Matkowski to Kontinen and Peers 3-6, 2-6. Sania Mirza had also ended her mixed doubles campaign in the second round, losing to Skupski and Smith in three sets, 6-4,3-6,5-7.