WTA Finals 2019: Bianca Andreescu falls to Simona Halep in opener

Defeat to Halep now means she has lost two matches in a row for the first time in 14 months

The Canadian has now lost two matches in a row for the first time in 14 months (EPA)

Bianca Andreescu’s barnstorming run through the ranks of the world’s top players has been one of the most striking features of a remarkable year in women’s tennis, but the 19-year-old Canadian’s progress stalled for the second time in a month here on Monday when she was beaten by Simona Halep in her opening match at the season-ending Shiseido WTA Finals. Halep showed great powers of resilience to fight back from match point down to win 3-6, 7-6, 6-3 after more than two and a half hours.

Andreescu, who beat Serena Williams in last month’s US Open final, had won her first seven matches against top 10 opponents – all of them this year – and had not lost a completed match since March until she was beaten by Naomi Osaka four weeks ago in Beijing. Defeat to Halep now means she has lost two matches in a row for the first time in 14 months.

While the round-robin format of these year-end championships means that she could yet go on to win the title, the Canadian struggled with a back problem in the closing stages of the match. “My back friggin’ hurts,” a disconsolate Andreescu said afterwards. Asked if she thought the injury might force her to pull out of her remaining two round-robin matches, she would only say: “We’ll see.”

Physical issues have been the only cloud on Andreescu’s horizon in 2019, the world No 4 having missed most of the clay-court season and the entire grass-court campaign. Considering those enforced breaks, the fact that she won her maiden Grand Slam title in New York and qualified for this tournament for the first time is testimony to her outstanding talent.

Halep has struggled with her own back problems in recent weeks and came here with minimal expectations. However, she has been reunited at this tournament with Darren Cahill, the Australian coach who guided her to her first Grand Slam title last summer but had taken off the rest of this year because of family commitments.

The Wimbledon champion was clearly determined to celebrate his return in style and delivered a gutsy victory. She called him to the court in each set and was told on one occasion that she could not bring him on court again.

“I called him so many times because I missed him this year,” Halep said with a smile. “He advised me that I was playing OK, even if I thought I wasn’t playing very solid during the match. He told me that was OK and I could serve better, which was true.”

Andreescu used to idolise Halep and had been eagerly awaiting her first meeting with the 28-year-old Romanian. Andreescu’s own parents are Romanian and the world No 4 spent several years of her childhood living in the country of their birth.

Fearless and athletic, Andreescu has a spectacularly creative game. A stunning display here in the first two sets included exquisite drop shots, crunching ground strokes, viciously sliced forehands and an outrageous between-the-legs shot from the baseline in the style of Nick Kyrgios which surprised Halep so much that she missed what should have been an easy forehand.

Andreescu took the first set after breaking serve three times and had a match point when Halep served at 5-6 in the second, but the former world No 1 held firm and never trailed in the tie-break, which she eventually took 8-6 as a result of two successive unforced errors by her opponent.

Both players took medical time-outs before the deciding set, Halep for a foot problem and Andreescu for treatment on her lower back. Andreescu was struggling with her movement in the final set but kept fighting back in a match that featured 13 breaks of serve. The last of them came when Andreescu served at 3-4, after which Halep held to love to claim her victory.

“In my opinion it was a great match from both sides,” Halep said. “I'm really proud actually that I could fight in this way because I’ve had a month when I didn't really practise because of my back injury, but it looks like I'm still there.Today it was a challenge because she's 10 years younger than me. It was a good fight. I'm happy about my victory.”

In the other Purple Group match Elina Svitolina began the defence of her title with a 7-6, 6-4 victory over Karolina Pliskova, who had gone into the tournament with a chance of finishing the year as world No 1. Pliskova has won more titles (four) and hit more aces (481) than any other player on the women’s tour this year, but has never progressed beyond the semi-finals in her three previous appearances in this tournament.

Svitolina, who is the only player in the eight-strong field yet to win a title this year, played consistently throughout without taking too many risks. Most of the points were won or lost on Pliskova’s racket as the Czech kept going for her shots.

Having retrieved an early break in the opening set, Svitolina won a marathon tie-break 14-12. Pliskova saved six set points, many of them with spectacular winners, but on the seventh the world No 2 hit a backhand wide. The turning point in the second set came when Svitolina broke serve to lead 4-3, after which the Ukrainian served out for victory after an hour and 53 minutes.