Defending US Open champ Clijsters slumps to shocking loss in third round of Australian Open

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Petrova stuns Clijsters at Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia — Kim Clijsters crashed out of the Australian Open in a shocking 6-0, 6-1 loss to No. 19-seeded Nadia Petrova on Friday.

Clijsters, who won the U.S. Open in September in only her third tournament back from two years off to get married and have a baby, seemed distracted as she won only five points in an 18-minute first set in her third-round match at the Australian Open.

It barely got better for her in the second, when she held serve only once. Clijsters made the match last 52 minutes by saving two match points, but was never in contention.

The loss ended chances of a quarterfinal between Clijsters and fellow Belgian comeback player Justine Henin, who advanced to the fourth round earlier Friday with a three-set win over Alisa Kleybanova.

The magnitude of the defeat was astonishing given that Clijsters had beaten Henin in a three-set final at a warmup event at the Brisbane International on Jan. 9 and had won two titles in her five previous tournaments since coming back.

The lopsided scoreline ranks among Clijsters’ worst. She only won four games in a 6-0, 6-4 loss to Henin in the 2003 French Open final.

Clijsters had only dropped one set in four previous wins over Petrova, whose best runs at the Grand Slam tournaments ended in semifinal losses at the French Open to Clijsters in 2003 and Henin in 2005.

Clijsters had reached the semifinals or better at her five previous trips to the Australian Open, including a loss to Henin in the 2004 final.

Henin, who was inspired to return to tennis by Clijsters’ U.S. Open run, staged another memorable recovery to advance in her first Grand Slam out of retirement with a 3-6, 6-4, 6-2 win over Kleybanova.

Facing two break points at 1-3 in the second set, it seemed as if Henin’s dramatic win over Olympic gold medalist and fifth-ranked Elena Dementieva on Wednesday had sapped too much energy. After all, that was only the seventh match for the seven-time Grand Slam winner since she returned from 20 months off the tour.

But Henin held and then converted her first break-point chance against Kleybanova in the next game. As soon Henin found her range, the match was as good as over.

“I kind of survived a little bit today,” Henin said. “It’s always good to win this kind of match because I came back from nowhere.

“Physically I suffered a little bit in the last two days, but finally I did it. I’m very happy that I have another chance to get better in the next round.”

Henin, unranked and playing on a wild-card entry, had to save set points to finish off Dementieva in a tiebreaker two nights earlier, drawing on the experience of losing to Clijsters after holding match points in the Brisbane International final.

That was Henin’s first tournament since she quit while holding the No. 1 ranking in May 2008. In what had shaped as a Belgian quarter, Henin set up a fourth-round against Yanina Wickmayer.

Wickmayer, who is ranked No. 16 but unseeded because she was under a suspension — since overturned — for breaching the World Anti-Doping Agency’s “whereabouts rule” when direct entries closed for the Australian Open — advanced 6-1, 6-7 (4), 6-3 over Sara Errani. She needed painkillers for back pain against Errani and said she’d need treatment before facing Henin.

Now the winner of that match will play Petrova.

Elsewhere, second-seeded Dinara Safina had a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Britain’s Elena Baltacha and next will play fellow Russian Maria Kirilenko, who beat Italian Roberta Vinci 7-5, 7-6 (4). Kirilenko ousted 2008 champion Maria Sharapova in the opening round.

“I think Sharapova hits it harder than Safina, so I am prepared for sure,” Kirilenko said.

Former No. 1 Jelena Jankovic was upset 6-2, 6-3 by No. 31 Alona Bondarenko, while China’s Zheng Jie upset 2007 Wimbledon finalist Marion Bartoli of France 5-7, 6-3, 6-0.

On the men’s side, U.S. Open champion Juan Martin del Potro had a 6-3, 0-6, 6-4, 7-5 win over Florian Mayer.

“I wanted to be alive a few more days here in Melbourne,” said the 21-year-old Argentine, who is a reigning major champion for the first time.

Del Potro lost the Roger Federer in the quarterfinals here last year, but avenged that by beating the 15-time Grand Slam winner in the U.S. Open final.

Asked if he felt any different this time around, del Potro laughed, held open his arms and said: “I feel bigger!”

“Of course, it’s beautiful, you get up, see the trophy of the U.S. Open. But you want more.”

A fourth-round win could set up a quarterfinal against former No. 1-ranked Andy Roddick, who beat Feliciano Lopez 6-7 (4), 6-4, 6-4, 7-6 (3). Roddick next plays 2007 runner-up Fernando Gonzalez, who was backed by a noisy Chilean contingent on Showcourt 2 as he beat Kazakhstan’s Evgeny Korolev 6-7 (5), 6-3, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4.

Britain’s Andy Murray had a 7-5, 6-1, 6-4 win over Florent Serra of France and will now play American John Isner, who fired 26 aces and hit 73 winners in a 6-1, 4-6, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5) victory over No. 12 Gael Monfils of France.

On paper, it was an upset, although 24-year-old Isner — who was given the last seeding for the tournament after Frenchman Gilles Simon withdrew — went into the match 2-1 against Monfils.

The winner of the Murray-Isner match is likely to face defending champion Rafael Nadal in the quarterfinals. Nadal had a night match Friday against Philipp Kohlschreiber of Germany.