Top seed Victoria Azarenka of Belarus crashed out of the French Open on Sunday with a 6-2, 7-6 (7/4) loss to a feisty Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia in the fourth round. Cibulkova, seeded 15th, will play either Samantha Stosur of Australia or Sloane Stephens of the United States for a place in the semi-finals. Azarenka won the Australian Open in January and had been expected to coast past Cibulkova having beaten her seven times out of eight previously.
But the little Slovakian, who reached the semi-finals here in 2009, handled the cold, windy conditions on the Suzanne Lenglen court far better than the tall Belarusian. “It wasn’t satisfying at all, not satisfying being out there playing like that. I do not know what to find positive in that. No excuses, just a bad performance,” Azarenka said The top seed looked formidable when she broke her opponent in the opening game but Cibulkova immediately equalised and then proceeded to break the favourite two more times in the set and six times in the entire match. In the second set, Azarenka appeared to be getting back on track as she broke to lead 2-0 but 23-year-old Cibulkova dug deep to run off four games in a row.
