Daria Kasatkina (the main favorite and ranked 8th in the world) categorically lost the match against Qinwen Zheng (29 WTA). The Russian was eliminated in the quarterfinals of the tournament in Abu Dhabi with a score of 1-6, 2-6.

Darya Kasatkina, defeat without right of appeal by Qinwen Zheng

Darya could not distinguish herself in any way in the return game, recording zero in the break section in the first leg. Unfortunately for Kasatkina, there were also big vulnerabilities on serve, and Zheng won twice on her opponent’s serve. Seth returned to him with a categorical score of 6-1.

Daria could not change anything in her game on the move, and the serve continued to cause significant damage to the main favorite (for the entire match, the Russian scored 50% of points on the first serve and 46% on the second).

On the other hand, Qinwen managed to have a flawless break point save percentage (4/4).

Zheng eventually led 3-0 (with two breaks) and Daria was already showing signs with her body language that she no longer believed in a miraculous comeback.

By the end of the match, Kasatkina won two more games, and the Chinese woman won the set (6-2) and finished the match after one hour and 18 minutes.

In the other match of the day, Belinda Bencic (second favorite) defeated the American Shelby Rogers (46th in the world ranking) in two sets with the score 7-6(5), 6-2.

The Mubadala Abu Dhabi Open runs from February 6 to 12 on hard, is a WTA 500 event and has a total prize pool of $780,637.