Maria Sharapova's U.S. Open dream was shattered by Flavia Pennetta on Friday, while men's number four Andy Murray avoided an early exit with a wild five-set victory over Robin Haase.
Pennetta, a 29-year-old Italian ranked 25th in the world, stunned an out-of-sorts Sharapova 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 to reach the fourth round.
Pennetta, a two-time U.S. Open quarterfinalist, took full advantage of the third-seeded Russian's 60 unforced errors and 12 double-faults, holding her own after Sharapova's second-set fight-back led to a tense third set and claiming what she called one of the biggest wins of her career.
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“I think in the third set I was a little bit nervous when I started to think too much about closing the match, so I'm really proud of my game,” said Pennetta, who will take on China's Peng Shuai for a quarterfinal spot.
Murray survives
Murray appeared to be heading for a second-round departure after dropping the first two sets to Haase.
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He had turned things around when he suddenly had to fend off a last furious challenge in a fifth set he called “a bit of a blur” to win 6-7(5), 2-6, 6-2, 6-0, 6-4.
The Briton got untracked to take a lead in the third set, and the 24-year-old Haase, whose career has been slowed by two knee surgeries, faded amid repeated calls for medical treatment.
Haase appeared to be a spent force after dropping the fourth set to love and losing the first four games of the fifth. He roared back to knot the set at 4-4, then saved two match points — the second on a successful challenge — before Murray sealed the victory.
Murray said he felt his “calmest” in the fifth set.
“Even when he started coming back I wasn't panicking, I wasn't getting frustrated,” he said. “I just stayed focused and managed to turn it around.
“I just stayed a little bit tougher than him and got the win.”
Second-seeded Rafael Nadal advanced with far less drama, moving on when France's Nicolas Mahut called it quits with an abdominal strain while trailing 6-2, 6-2. Nadal, who had to battle to a three-set first-round win over Andrey Golubev, was sorry Mahut was hurt, but not sorry to be safely through along with Murray, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer.
Mixed day for Indians
Leander Paes entered the mixed doubles quarterfinals while Rohan Bopanna was through to the men's doubles third round on a reasonably good day for the Indians.
Paes and his Russian partner Elena Vesnina, seeded seventh, defeated the Taipei-Polish pair of Yung-Jan Chan and Mariusz Fyrstenberg 6-2, 6-7 (7), 1-0 (4). In men's doubles, Bopanna and his Pakistani partner Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi got the better of the American-German team of James Cerretani and Philipp Marx 7-6 (3), 7-6 (4). However, there was disappointment for Bopanna in the mixed doubles event.
The Indian and his American partner Vania King, seeded fifth, lost 6-7 (1), 6-4, 0-1 (7) to the Czech-German pair of Barbora Zahlavova Strycova and Philipp Petzschner.