Kazakh-Canadian pair Anna Danilina (world No. 6) and Leylah Fernandez (No. 67) failed to overcome Chinese duo Tang Qianhui (No. 61) and Xu Yifan (No. 31) in the first round of the WTA-500 tournament in the US capital, losing 2:6, 4:6. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Kursiv Media.
In the first set, Danilina and Fernandez lost their serve to love in the third and seventh games. In the second set, they managed two breaks, but their opponents had one more break.
The match lasted 1 hour and 13 minutes. The winners won 57 points compared to 38 for the losers.
Had Danilina and Fernandez won, they would have faced legendary Venus Williams (No. 124) on court. The 46-year-old American, paired with Russian Diana Shnaider (No. 33), defeated her compatriot Quinn Gleason (No. 35) and Norwegian Ulrikke Eikeri (No. 39) 6:3, 6:4 in the first round. Now the Chinese pair will play the superstar.
Danilina was the only representative of Kazakh tennis at the 2026 Washington Open.
The Washington Open (Mubadala Citi DC Open) was founded as a men's clay-court tournament in 1969. Since 1986, it has been played on hard courts, and since 2011, it has included women's events. It is the first and only joint ATP and WTA tournament with a '500' ranking.
The women's tournament prize fund is $1.6 million, while the men's is $2.4 million.
Past winners include Americans Michael Chang, Andre Agassi, Jimmy Connors, Andy Roddick, Jessica Pegula, Coco Gauff, as well as Frenchman Yannick Noah, Czech Ivan Lendl, Swede Stefan Edberg, Australian Lleyton Hewitt, and Russians Nadezhda Petrova and Svetlana Kuznetsova.