With the likes of Elena Rybakina, Coco Gauff, and Amanda Anisimova pulling out, the field at the Wuhan Open was already thin. It saw another major shakeup after Wednesday’s action ended, with the top two seeds knocked out in their opening matches after receiving a first-round bye.

20-1. That was the win-loss record that Aryna Sabalenka had at the Wuhan Open before her match against Ann Li. The World No. 2 has won the tournament thrice, with back-to-back titles in 2018 and 2019, and started her match like the favorite to win she was, dominating the first set.

Li watched the first set slip away after Sabalenka rattled off eight consecutive points to finish it. There was, though, one key thing to notice about the Belarusian, who had black tape on her right knee. Whether it was for protection or precaution, no one knows, but once Sabalenka went 4-2 up in the second set, the tape became an afterthought. The American, however, turned things around in spectacular fashion, taking nine of the next 11 games to level the match and move ahead 5-2 in the deciding set.

Still, Sabalenka refused to go down without a fight. With the physio stepping in to retape her right leg midway through the third, she dug deep to save five match points and make it 5-3. Li had two more chances to close things out at 5-4, but Sabalenka denied her again, producing a forehand winner followed by a backhand winner to draw level at 5-5. She then held comfortably at love to force a tiebreak.

Even there, Sabalenka kept pushing, fending off two more match points, one of them with a stunning forehand that clipped the corner. But Li held her nerve in the end, putting away a forehand winner on her 10th match point to complete the upset. And just like that, Sabalenka will fail to reach the last four in Wuhan for the first time.

Sabalenka’s bid for her first French Open title had unraveled in a similar manner, when it looked like the win was hers to take. The then-world No. 1 led 6-3, 4-1 and was two points away from victory at 5-3. But the windy conditions at Roland Garros completely threw her off, leading to a 6-0 final set loss, something that happened to her against Jessica Pegula in Berlin as well.

Her losses against Ekaterina Alexandrova and Sara Bejlek in Toronto and Cincinnati also saw the four-time Major champion fail to hold leads. Not to mention the Australian Open final, where Sabalenka let go of a 3-0 lead in the final set against Elena Rybakina.

With the Wuhan Open loss, Sabalenka saw her tenth since winning Miami in March. Meanwhile, for Li, it marked her career-best win by ranking and her first over Sabalenka in four WTA Tour Driven by Mercedes-Benz meetings.

What stood out were Sabalenka’s 44 unforced errors in her three-set battle, while Li was far more disciplined, recording just 28 errors of her own. Despite finishing behind Sabalenka on total points, the American did enough to secure the win.

So, former British tennis star Naomi Broady had something to say during Sky Sports‘ post-match coverage, as she watched the shocking upset.

“Tell me another sport where you can win more points and come away not having won the match. It’s so often about which points you win in tennis, getting yourself through the important ones. Sabalenka with three points more in total across the two and a half hour match,” she said.

“Ann Li with more opportunities; she took just four of 17 break point chances, but the unforced errors were leaking for Sabalenka at times, and that cost her in the end.”

Sabalenka had lost early in Beijing as well, in the third round to Nikola Bartunkova (4-6, 3-6), so this is bound to hurt. Per The Independent, this is the first time Sabalenka has suffered back-to-back defeats in a year and a half.

Jessica Pegula Has the Same Fate at the Wuhan Open

Jessica Pegula started her Wuhan Open campaign against Jelena Ostapenko. While Pegula dominated the first set, her control of the match began to unravel as the second set progressed.

After breaking Ostapenko for a 3-2 lead, she failed to capitalise on three match points in the tiebreak, including a routine volley she sent into the net with the court wide open. That missed opportunity proved costly as Ostapenko clawed her way back into the contest.

The American then struggled to contain the Latvian’s growing aggression in the decider, as Ostapenko finished with 46 winners, including 10 aces, but also 37 unforced errors and 11 double faults. Pegula’s inability to close out the match despite an advantage was clear, as it ended in a 6-2, 6-7 (7-9), 3-6 defeat for her. Even when Ostapenko failed to serve out the match after going up 30-0, Pegula could not take advantage. Two clean return winners helped Ostapenko break her in the following game, leaving the American unable to force another comeback.

For Ostapenko, it meant her first win over a Top 5 opponent since last year’s Stuttgart final, where she had defeated Sabalenka 6-4, 6-1. It also marks her third victory in seven career encounters with Pegula, dating back to 2015, with the latest being a payback for their 2023 Doha meeting, when Pegula overturned the contest 2-6, 6-2, 7-5 after saving two match points.

Notably, Pegula arrived in Wuhan looking to revive her late-season campaign after stepping away from competition following her US Open semifinal loss to Aryna Sabalenka. The 32-year-old had reached at least the semifinals in three of the four hard-court tournaments she played after Wimbledon, but the demanding stretch eventually caught up with her. She hence withdrew from Singapore and Beijing to give herself time to recover.

“Sometimes things can happen because of the accumulation of a lot of matches, playing a lot of tennis,” Pegula said ahead of Wuhan Open.

After several weeks at home with her husband, Taylor Gahagen, and their three dogs, Pegula said she felt “back to normal” and was eager to finish the season strongly.

Even though she has already qualified for the WTA Finals, Wuhan, where she had finished runner-up in 2025, was a tournament she had always intended to return to, with the American saying she wanted to make the most of the WTA 1000 event.

“I think competing at a WTA 1000 is always a good time to win the tournament and to try to do your best,” she added. “I didn’t necessarily want to skip Beijing, so for me, coming back to Wuhan was something I always planned to do.”

Now, she will be looking forward to the Ningbo Open, which starts in five days.