Ivanovic loses shamefully; Jankovic has another chance to become No. 1

On Thursday, all of the third round match winners played for a semifinal berth. There were some shock defeats, including No. 6 seed Chakvetdze being ousted, and also the world No. 1 was sent packing.

The first match to take the courts included Svetlana Kuznetsova and 15-year-old rising star Michelle Larcher de Brito. Kuznetsova was struggling throughout the match, winning a tight first set, losing the second, but eventually coming back from nearly 2-0 down to win the match, 75 26 64.

"I went to watch her yesterday; I expected her to be good," Kuznetsova said. "This is my first tournament since Wimbledon, so it's hard to get the rhythm back. I was fighting a lot in this match, and that's why I won. But I give her all credit."

"I got a little bit tight sometimes, but I think I did pretty well throughout the whole match," said Larcher de Brito, who already has two Top 20 wins to her name and was looking for her first Top 10 win. "She's a Grand slam champion. She's a really great player. She was running me side to side and it was really tough. But it was a fun match; it was a good fight and I enjoyed myself."

On the same court in the night session, Tamira Paszek and World No. 1 Ana Ivanovic took the court. Ivanovic was entering the match with a thumb injury, which she said was holding her back throughout the match. Austrian Paszek surprised the crowd with an easy first set win, but Ivanovic took full control in the second, and eventually at the end of the match, the Austrian was in complete happiness after her win to the No. 1.

"The first thing I was thinking was, 'Well girl, you made it. It's over now,'" Paszek said. "The second thing was that it was the first Top 10 player I've beaten. I've had a lot of chances before and played some great matches but never did that. It was also the first night match I won in my career. So there were a lot of first times today. I don't know how, but I managed it."

"It was very frustrating because I didn't know how it was going to pull up; I was in pain through the whole match," said Ivanovic, who was struggling with a hurt right thumb coming into the match. "The pain wasn't so sharp but I couldn't hold my racquet on my forehand. I tried to fight as much as I could. I really wanted to win this match. But obviously she's a very good player. She figured it out."

Another match which took the courts was between Anna Chakvetadze and Marion Bartoli. Bartoli is now 3-1 in head-to-head results after winning to Chakvetadze 46 75 76(4), previously beating her in Luxembourg and Stanford two weeks ago.

In other matches, No.2 seed Jelena Jankovic ended the run of Canadian wildcard Stéphanie Dubois with a 63 62 win; No.7 seed Dinara Safina continued her strong summer with a 62 62 win over No.9 seed Patty Schnyder; Dominika Cibulkova beat No.12 seed Nadia Petrova, 76(2) 62; and No.11 seed Victoria Azarenka won inwhen Virginie Razzano retired down 76(4) 20 due to a thigh injury.

Jankovic previously won to Canadian Aleksandra Wozniak in the second round, and has won to another Canadian, Stephanie Dubois, in two consecutive days, and she has another chance to become No. 1, after Ivanovic has dropped out of the tournament.

"I took out two Canadians - maybe the people here will start to hate me now," Jankovic joked. "In those two matches the crowd was obviously against me. It's not easy to be in this kind of atmosphere, but I tried my best. I really wanted to focus on myself and my game, on what I have to do in order to win. I'm pleased with how I handled it. I'm happy to have gotten through this match."