WTA Elite Trophy: Julia Goerges sends Kristina Mladenovic packing; Sloane Stephens exits after retiring injured

Zhuhai: Julia Goerges beat top seed Kristina Mladenovic 6-2, 7-6 (7/4) to reach the WTA Elite Trophy semi-finals and send the Frenchwoman tumbling out of the world top 10 on Friday. Sloane Stephens retired in her match against Barbora Strycova, extending her winless streak since lifting the US Open trophy in September. The No 7 seed Goerges joins American CoCo Vandeweghe, Australia’s Ashleigh Barty, and Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia in the race to the final in Zhuhai, southern China. [caption id=“attachment_4191863” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Julia Goerges beat Kristina Mladenovic to advance to the semi-finals of WTA Elite Trophy. Twitter/@WTA[/caption] Mladenovic needed a straight-sets win to reach the semis but instead went down in one hour, 36 minutes, ceding her No 10 ranking to America’s CoCo Vandeweghe. It ends a career-high season for Mladenovic, now World No 11. She finished 2016 ranked 42nd but won her first tour title in St Petersburg and reached three other finals this year. Later China’s No 1 player Peng Shuai downed Elena Vesnina 6-2, 1-0 after the Russian was forced to retire due to injury. But despite her win, the round robin format of the tournament means Peng, a wildcard entry making her debut in Zhuhai, will not go through to the semis. The 25-year-old, the oldest player in the tournament, lost to Vandeweghe earlier in the week. Sloane Stephens, part of the US team looking ahead to next weekend’s Fed Cup final against Belarus, crashed out of the tournament in Zhuhai with a knee injury and sealed her defeat to Czechoslovakia’s Strycova 5-0. “My knee wasn’t doing what I wanted it to do,” she told journalists after the match. “So, yeah, it’s like it’s better to just stop now, because obviously I wasn’t moving too quickly out there. I just thought, yeah, better if I just stop.” She added that she hoped to be fit enough for the Fed Cup. “Obviously I’ve got to get my knee in order first. Hopefully I can do that before next weekend.”