Petra Kvitova's US Open preparations hit a snag as she was surprisingly beaten by China's Shuai Zhang at the Connecticut Open.
Having failed to reach any great heights on the American hard-court swing, the Czech, seeded third, will have fancied a deep run in the final tournament before the last grand slam of the year, which begins in New York on Sunday.
But she was ousted in straight sets in New Haven as Zhang dropped only three games in a 6-2 6-1 whipping and must now head to Flushing Meadows with just four victories since winning in Birmingham on the grass back in June.
It was also a bad day for fourth seed Kristina Mladenovic and seventh seed Barbora Strycova as they both crashed out.
Frenchwomen Mladenovic went down 7-5 7-5 to Hungary's Timea Babos while Strycova was beaten 7-5 6-3 by Russian Daria Kasatkina.
There was a rare win for Eugenie Bouchard, who beat America Laura David 6-1 6-4 to register just a third victory since the Madrid Open in April, while Elena Vesnina's slump shows no sign of ending as she lost 7-5 7-5 to Ana Bogdan. Since winning in Indian Wells in March, the Russian has not got to the quarter-final of any event.
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova beat Christina McHale 3-6 6-2 6-4, Kirsten Flipkens saw odd Lesia Tsurenko 6-2 6-3 while Daria Gavrilova edged a hard-fought contest with Kristyna Pliskova 7-4 4-6 7-5.
Source: PA
