And then there was one, seed in Hobart

13 January 2009, by Hobart International Tennis

Italy’s Flavia Pennetta is the only seeded player left in the Moorilla Hobart International after two more seeds bite the dust.

Fourth seed Jie Cheng, of China, and the seventh-seeded Ukrainian Alona Bondarenko, lost in straight sets to unseeded players today.

Promising Slovakian Magdalena Rybarikova will be out to make it a clean sweep of seeds from Hobart when she meets Pennetta later on.

World No.24, Cheng was no match for the unseeded Argentine Gisela Dulko – ranked 49 – losing 6-3 6-3.

Czech Petra Kvitova – who gave Australian Sally Peers the harshest of welcomes to the WTA on Sunday – also took care of business against Bondarenko, 6-2 6-1.

The powerful Czech is ranked 49 in the world compared to Bondarenko’s 34 ranking.

Cheng and Bondarenko will follow the tournament’s five other upset seeds in making the walk of shame to the practice courts.

The other ousted seeds are Swiss Patty Schnyder, Russian Anna Chakvetadze, Hungarian Agnes Szavay, Canadian Aleksandra Wozniak and Thailand’s Tamarine Tanasugarn.