Angelique Kerber’s tennis career ended after the former world number one and three-time Grand Slam champion lost to
Qinwen Zheng (China) by 1-2 (7:6, 4:6, 6:7) in the quarterfinals of the Olympic tennis tournament in Paris.
Australian Open runner-up Qinwen Zheng, who is 6th-seeded, prevailed in three sets after 3 hours and 4 minutes of play.
Angelique Kerber prevailed in the first set after a tiebreak, but in the second the Chinese won 6:4. In the decisive third set, Kerber led by 4:1 but conceded an equalizer for 4:4 and again it came to a tiebreak, in which the Chinese closed the match with her fourth match point.
Angelique Kerber announced last week that the Olympics would be her last tournament. She won the Australian and US Opens in 2016, as well as the Olympic silver in the same year and Wimbledon in 2018. Angelique Kerber has 14 career titles and spent 34 weeks at the top of the world rankings.
The 36-year-old German was unable to regain her top form after maternity leave. But she last impressed at the Olympics, where she beat former world number one Naomi Osaka (Japan), Jaqueline Cristian (Romania) and former US Open runner-up Leylah Fernandez (Canada) before losing to Qinwen Zheng.
In the semi-finals, Qinwen Zheng will meet French Open champion for the past three years and world number one Iga Swiatek (Poland), who in another quarter-final match prevailed over Danielle Collins (USA) by 2-1 (6:1, 2:6, 4:1) and retiring of the American player. Iga Swiatek is undefeated in 25 consecutive matches on the courts of “Roland Garros” in Paris.
The Polish player started strong and only gave her opponent a game in the first set. In the second, Danielle Collins broke in the second game and that gave her confidence as she took control of Iga Swiatek once again and equalized the sets at 6:2.
Danielle Collins suffered an injury and after a medical break at 0:3 gave up at 1:4, which legitimized Iga Swiatek’s victory.
Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova (Czech Republic) was eliminated in the singles competition after losing by 0-2 (4:6, 2:6) to Anna Karolina Schmiedlova (Slovakia).
