Jabeur crashes out to Gracheva in Miami

MIAMI GARDENS, United States: Fourth seed Ons Jabeur crashed out of the Miami Open on Friday, losing her opening match to Russian qualifier Varvara Gracheva 6-2, 6-2. Tunisian Jabeur, beaten finalist at Wimbledon and the US Open last year, has been working her way back from injury and on her return earlier this month went out in the third round at Indian Wells.

Jabeur underwent surgery after suffering a knee injury at the Australian Open, and subsequently missed the WTA Tour’s Middle East swing. She looked well short of her best against the 22-year-old Gracheva and had two medical visits during the one hour 11 minute match.

The win was the biggest scalp yet for Gracheva, who earlier this month reached her first WTA final, losing in Austin to Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk. “The plan was, of course like all matches, to be as stable as possible, to try to make her work as much points as possible, and of course wait for comfortable ones to attack,” Gracheva said after her third career win over a top ten opponent.

“I’ve just probably caught this wave where I’m stable, where I always have a chance to play my game, be aggressive, cause troubles for the others by the game style. I’ve just got to try to keep rolling on this way,” she added.