Chinese teenage duo Sun Shengnan and Liu Wanting earned their chance of reaching the semi-finals at the China Open WTA tennis tournament but failed to make it against Spaniard Nuria Llagostera Vives and Maria Vento-Kabchi from Venzuela here on Friday.

Liu and Sun, pairing with each other for less than half a year, lost 5-7, 6-1, 6-2 in one hour and 57 minutes to the 118-ranked Llagostera Vives and Vento-Kabchi, who ousted top seeds Alicia Molik of Australia and Meghann Shaughnessy of the United States on Tuesday to make the quarters.

"We have been too eager to win at the second set, and that motion continued to bother us in the following set," said Liu Wanting.

The new generation to China's female tennis, ranked 877 in the world and entering the 585,000 US dollars hardcourt event with a wildcard, committed 18 unforced errors against only 3 winners in the match, which should have seen a miracle coming out of the 18- year-old Sun and the 16-year-old Liu of reaching a WTA Tour semi- finals.

They advanced to the second round with a 6-7(5), 6-2, 7-6(4) victory over 101-ranked Australian pair Lisa Mcshea and Bryanne Stewart.

"Beating a pair of 101-ranked opponents did not bring more pressure on our shoulder. The only reason for the defeat is that we had needless thoughts during the match," said Sun.

Sun Shengnan, the former Junior doubles champion of Australian Open in 2004 pairing with Chan Yung Jan from Chinese Taipei, served in the fifth game of the third set, but the slow and inexperienced Liu performed a terrible net play to give up the decisive game before losing the decider with being broken thrice.

"I've been too slow in returning and made too much errors. My racket went out for the ball, but my paces could not keep up with it, and that made the errors," said the depressed Liu.

"I don't think Liu played terrible, but I hope she can become more active when playing close to the net," commented Sun.

Source: Xinhua