5 Jan 2017

Serena "frankly unprofessional" at ASB Classic

1:34 pm on 5 January 2017

Top seed Serena Williams hasn't held back in assessing her error-strewn performance during a shock defeat at the ASB Classic, describing it as "unprofessional".

Serena Williams during her second round singles match at the ASB Classic.

Serena Williams during her second round singles match at the ASB Classic. Photo: Photosport

The world No.2 and winner of 22 grand slam singles titles lost her second-round match to fellow American Madison Brengle 6-4 6-7 (3-7) 6-4.

She struggled with the windy conditions in Auckland on Wednesday, producing a host of unforced errors - 88 according to one count - against a dogged opponent who kept returning the ball.

Williams saved three match points, but then double-faulted to hand world No.72 Brengle a huge victory after two hours and 13 minutes on court.

"You really have to go back to the drawing board, because it's quite frankly unprofessional," she said.

She added: "Eighty-eight is way too many unforced errors.

"You can't expect to win hitting that many errors."

She said she "abhorred" the conditions, which were "just way too much for me", but also acknowledged that Brengle had had to put up with them as well.

"I can take solace in the fact the conditions won't be like this in Melbourne (for the Australian Open)," said Williams after just her second match in four months.

"This is almost not a great opportunity to assess your game, to be honest."

Williams had conceded just one game in the pair's previous meeting in Madrid in 2015.

It had looked plain sailing again as she raced out to a 4-1 lead, but Brengle broke back twice to go one set up.

Brengle then went a break up in the second set, but Williams broke back and then levelled in the tiebreak.

The third set went to serve, until Williams produced her fourth double fault of the match to go with her nine aces.

Brengle, 26, agreed that being consistent was the key.

"I just played for every point," she said.

"I definitely tried to be (consistent), and I tried to use the slice and hit as many balls as a I could."

In the quarter-finals, she will meet seventh-seeded Latvian Jelena Ostapenko, who beat Crotia's Mirjana Lucic-Baroni 6-2 7-6 (7-3).

Williams' loss meant the tournament lost its two big drawcards in the space of a few hours.

Earlier on the same court, sister Venus, the No.2 seed and 2015 champion, had won her rain-interrupted first-round match against New Zealand wildcard Jade Lewis.

But she then had to withdraw from the tournament with an arm injury that had hampered her in the 7-6 (7-2) 6-2 defeat of 18-year-old Lewis.

Also departing on Wednesday was No.6 seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, who failed to make it past the first round.

The Russian was upset by German Julia Goerges, last year's runner-up, 6-3 6-4.

- AAP