Indian tennis star Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis’ 41-match winning streak came to halt after the world number one womne’s doubles pair went down fighting in the quarterfinals of the Qatar Open, here.
Sania and her Swiss partner Mirza lost 2-6, 6-4, 10-5 to Russian pair Elena Vesnina and Daria Kasatkina on Thursday night.
The last time the Indo-Swiss pair, who have won three doubles Grand Slams in a row, had lost was way back in Cincinatti last August.
After surviving a gruelling three sets win over an unseeded Chinese pairing in the last round here, luck finally ran out for Sania and Hingis against the Russians despite dominanting the first set.
Sania and Hingis have together won four titles this year out of an overall trophy count of 13.
They started the year with wins in Brisbane and Sydney before completing a hat-trick of Grand Slam titles at the Australian Open. The duo had won the St Petersburg ladies title earlier this month.
Wawrinka reaches final
Stan Wawrinka advanced to the Dubai Tennis Championships final after Nick Kyrgios of Australia retired during their semifinal with a back injury on Friday.
Wawrinka was leading 6-4, 3-0 at the time.
For the second day in a row, Kyrgios received treatment on his back during a match. On Friday, the physiotherapist came to the court during the seventh game changeover.
The 20-year-old Kyrgios became the youngest active player to win an ATP Tour title, at Marseille last week.
“It’s been bothering me the last couple of days,” Kyrgios said. “I had a bit of a hip injury at the start of Marseille. That was still sort of bothering me a little bit. I have been feeling so bad every day, like I’ve got some viral infection, as well.”
Kyrgios is the second significant retirement in two days at Dubai. Novak Djokovic retired from his quarterfinal with infected eyes on Thursday.
Wawrinka took a commanding 4-1 lead in the first set, but Kyrgios fought back to even the score at 4-4. From that point, Wawrinka won the final five games.
Elsewher, Andrea Petkovic of Germany eliminated fourth-seeded Garbine Muguruza 6-1, 5-7, 6-2 to reach the Qatar Open semifinals on Thursday.
Petkovic will next face Jelena Ostapenko of latvia.