Caroline Wozniacki Loses At US Open And Drops Out Of Top 10

Written by: Staff on 30th August 2012

Caroline Wozniacki Loses At US Open And Drops Out Of Top 10

epa03373100 Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark hits a return to Inna-Camelia Begu of Romania during their match on the second day of the 2012 US Open Tennis Championship at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, New York, USA, 28 August 2012. The US Open runs through Sunday 09 September 2012. EPA/PETER FOLEY |

Former world no.1 Caroline Wozniacki is set to drop out of the WTA’s top ten after suffering a second successive first round exit at a Grand Slam event. Questions are now being asked about the 21 year-old Dane’s sustained fitness and commitment after a painful exit against 96th ranked Irina-Camelia Begu.

Wozniacki sustained a knee injury playing last week’s New Haven Open, where she said goodbye to a 20 match winning steak as she was forced to retire against Maria Kirilenko and admit failure in the bid to emulate the legendary trio of Martina Navratilova, Steffi Graf and Chris Evert as the only players to win five consecutive championships at the same tournament.

Clearly the knee was a factor in Wozniacki’s demise and she has not gone past the quarter final of a major event throughout 2012, with this New York demise following on from her Wimbledon exit at the hands of 37th ranked Tamira Paszek of Austria.

“I think it’s a temporary issue,” said Wozniacki of her injury. “Hopefully it will get better quickly. It’s frustrating to have some injuries, but it happens to everyone. It’s just about moving on.”

Wozniacki, now working with former Australian Open champion Thomas Johansson as a part-time coach, has not won a title for more than a year and many correlate her demise with the progress of her romantic relationship with USTA PGA champion golfer Rory McIlroy.

Naturally she discounts such theories and maintains: “You always want to go in and do your best no matter what’s happening out there.”

In the last two years at the US Open, Wozniacki has been top seed and was hugely disappointed by her semi-final exits. This was a far more painful blow against her confidence but she insisted: “I tried. I didn’t succeed. I didn’t play particularly well, made too many errors. It’s unfortunate because it’s a huge tournament, a tournament you want to play well in.”

Topics: American tennis news, Caroline Wozniacki, Dutch tennis news, Irina-Camelia Begu, Maria Kirilenko, Sports, Tennis News, US Open 2012, Wozniacki