Pennetta Eliminates Stosur to Reach Semi-Finals

8/6/2010

Carlsbad, Calif. - On a beautiful, sunny day at the La Costa Resort and Spa, fifth-seeded Flavia Pennetta of Italy ousted second-seeded Samantha Stosur of Australia, 6-4, 6-3, in the opening match of Friday’s day session.

With a semifinal spot on the line, both players exchanged an early service break in the first set, but with the score knotted at 3-3, Pennetta broke Stosur at love to take a 4-3 lead. Later at 5-4, the Italian locked up the first set in 41 minutes as she served a love game.

Pennetta, who improved her career head-to-head record against Stosur to 3-0, broke the Australian to open the second set and went on to build a 3-1 lead.

Later, with the Italian leading 4-2, Stosur fought off two break points and managed to hold serve to pull to 4-3, but that was as close as she would get as Pennetta easily held serve at love to extend her lead to 5-3. The Australian served to stay in the match, but Pennetta, sensing the opportunity to advance to the semifinals, broke serve to wrap up the match in one hour and 12 minutes.

Pennetta will face Russia’s Svetlana Kuznetsova in the first match of the day on Stadium Court. The Russian leads 3-0 in career head-to-head meetings.