Top seed on fire; Peer falls in quarters

No. 2 seed Shahar Peer was on fire all week, until Friday, as she lost in straight sets to American Jill Craybas, while top seed Maria Kirilenko advanced in straight sets.

Kirilenko won her quarterfinal to No. 5 seed Pauline Parmentier easily, 63 62.

“Every point, I had to fight and win, I couldn’t just hope for her to make mistakes," said Kirilenko afterwards, adding that two weeks of hard physical training after the US Open had given her extra stamina and confidence to see matches through.

"Today, all my shots worked," the Russian said. "I tried to mix the serve, and it worked. I think I had a lot of winners. I'm just happy with the way I played."

“I think it’s going to be a difficult match for sure tomorrow," Kirilenko said about playing her semifinal oppenent, Kaia Kanepi. "It's going to be long points, and she's a girl who is hitting the ball hard. I'm just going to make a plan for the match and do my best."

"I have beaten Parmentier and I haven’t beaten Kirilenko, so I’d better play Kirilenko and beat her," the Estonian smiled.

The match between Peer and Craybas, ended with a 62 75 victory in Craybas's hands, and now there are no seeds left in the bottom half of the draw. Craybas will next face Samantha Stosur who ousted Ekaterina Makarova, 63 64.

"I've never played her before, so it should be a fun match," Craybas said of Stosur. "I think I need to take her serve a little bit early to give her less time for the next ball, and so it doesn’t kick up too high on me, because it tends to get pretty high. I'll stick to the same game plan I had today, which was to be aggressive and just go for my shots."