Heather Watson chucks chance to win in Indian Wells second round
Sunday 13 March 2016 11:34, UK
Heather Watson threw away a winning position in the deciding set to crash out of Indian Wells to Monica Niculescu.
Watson was leading 2-0 in the third set after winning seven games in a row but fell apart, losing the final six successive games, to fall 6-4 2-6 6-2 to the 32nd seed.
The British number two started poorly and trailed 5-1 before finding her feet, but she had left herself too much to do and conceded the first set.
She broke to love in the opening game of the second but immediately lost her serve despite holding a 40-0 advantage.
The determined Watson again broke to love on the Romanian's next two service games and then reeled off five games in a row on her way to levelling the match.
But, after being in control 2-0 up in the decider, things began to unravel and Niculescu rattled off the remaining six games to advance to the second round.
Meanwhile, third-seed Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland rallied from a 4-1 deficit to thwart Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia 6-3 3-6 7-5.
Two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, the eighth-seed from the Czech Republic, needed a third-set tiebreaker to beat Danka Kovinic of Montenegro 6-3 4-6 7-6 (5).
Eleventh-seed Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic lost 6-4 6-4 to Yaroslava Shvedova of Kazakhstan, Lesia Tsurenko of Ukraine upset 15th-seed Sara Errani of Italy 6-4 6-3, and 19th-seed Jelena Jankovic of Serbia, last year's runner-up and the 2010 champion, rolled over Carina Witthoeft of Germany 6-1 6-3.
Jankovic will face American Coco Vandeweghe, who beat two-time Grand Slam champion and 16th-seed Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia 6-4, 6-3.
Also in the second round, last year's champion Simona Halep beat American Vania King 6-1 6-1.
