Fewer than half the seeds in the top half of the BNP Paribas Open remain standing after their first matches, with the tournament heading into its first weekend in Indian Wells.
Perhaps some were less of an upset than others. Former No2 Agnieszka Radwanska had barely made the cut-off for the 32 seeds after many months of injury problems.
It is more than a year since she made a final, and even though there were signs early in 2018, especially in Australia, that the old magic was returning, she faced one of the most exciting young players on the tour in 20-year-old Naomi Osaka, ranked just a few places below Radwanska, and with a fourth-round run via two top-20 players at the Australian Open to her name.
If that was not enough, Osaka had already dismissed former champion Maria Sharapova in the first round, and she would set a similarly convincing scoreline over Radwanska, 6-3, 6-2.
Another seed who has contended with extended injury problems is No19 Svetlana Kuznetsova, and in a battle of the generations, the 32-year-old former No2 was beaten convincingly by 19-year-old Aryna Sabalenka, 6-4, 6-3.
Kuznetsova was runner-up in Indian Wells last year, her most recent final, but since a good grass showing last summer, the popular Russian has won only three matches, played just five tournaments, and this was her first event of the year after undergoing wrist surgery.
So no surprise, perhaps, though credit to Sabalenka, who is clearly one to watch during 2018. She ended last season in fine fettle with semis in Tashkent, a final run in Tianjin and then her first title in Mumbai.
She will now play 18-year-old Marketa Vondrousova, who certainly did score an upset in the heat of the afternoon. She took on No11 seed, Johanna Konta, who has been struggling with form and confidence this year—six wins in five tournaments—and at the end of 2017—four straight first-round losses. Yet this time last year, Konta was riding a high with a quarter-final run at the Australian Open and then her first Premier Mandatory title in Miami.
So when she pulled back two opening breaks of serve and a 0-3 deficit to 4-4, and served to take the lead for the first time, it looked as though she would pull through. But she was having to work hard to hold serve throughout the set.
The teenager was also wayward on serve, and fell behind 15-40, but she saved three set points, and then a fourth, to take it to a tie-break. Now it was Konta’s turn to double fault, and Vondrousova sealed the set, 7-6(5), with a forehand winner.
The second set began just as tightly, with long service games, and eventually a break-through for Konta, 4-2. However, the Briton could not hold on to her advantage over the former junior No1, and Vondrousova blasted through four straight games to win set and match, 6-4, but it had been a considerable battle, two and a quarter hours, and the two were separated by only three points in 187 played.
According to BBC Sport, Konta admitted this was “one of the toughest losses I’ve had”, but went on:
“I still think there’s a lot of good things to take from this match in how I competed. Obviously, there are things that I 100 percent want to be doing better, but I will try not to overanalyse a match like this either.”
As for Vondrousova, she said of her victory:
“I would say it’s my biggest win. I was trying to fight for every ball, because she was getting better and better, I was trying so hard!”
The reward for the youngest player in the top 100 is the third-youngest player, Sabalenka.
But the biggest upset of the day was reserved for American qualifier, Sachia Vickery, who had already put out Eugenie Bouchard in the first round. Now she took on No3 seed Garbiñe Muguruza, the champion at Wimbledon last year who rose to No1 during the autumn.
What’s more, the 22-year-old Vickery, who announced her intent for the season with a semi-final run in her first tournament of 2018, Auckland, beat the Spaniard from a set and a break down.
Muguruza led, 6-2, 3-0, and 40-0 on serve, but the American underdog, with the weight of the centre court home crowd behind her, fought back as Muguruza’s error count rose—to 45 by the end of the two-and-a-quarter-hour tussle.
Vickery finally levelled in the second set with a break to love in the eighth game, and held to take the lead. Muguruza had two points to take the set into a tiebreak but Vickery held off her opponent with a forehand winner, 7-5. And from 1-1 in the decider, the American reeled off five games, and 12 of the last 14 points, for her biggest career win to date, 6-1.
She told the crowd after the match:
“I just tried to fight every point and hang in there. The crowd was so amazing and got behind me, and the atmosphere really helped me, even though I was feeling it a little bit physically… I’ve just worked so hard for so many years and I’ve been so close… and this is just the most amazing night of my life, I couldn’t be happier.”
The win sets an exciting showdown with Osaka.
In another second-round upset, Australian Open semi-finalist, No22 seed Elise Mertens, was beaten by Wang Qiang, 4-6, 6-3, 6-3. She will next play No15 seed, Kristina Mladenovic, who survived a strong challenge from Sam Stosur, 7-5, 7-5.
In the other quarter, another American wild card, Amanda Anisimova, who is the youngest woman in the draw at just 16, beat No23 seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, 6-4, 6-1, after making a strong run to the semis at the WTA125 in Indian Wells last week. But her next hurdle is one of the most challenging in tennis at the moment. Petra Kvitova became the first player to win two titles in 2018, in St Petersburg and Doha.
And with her first-round win in Indian Wells, the popular Czech, who a year ago was unable to play following surgery to her stabbed playing hand, is now on a 14-match winning streak. And she showed all her fighting qualifies in a marathon three-and-a-quarter-hour win over Yulia Putintseva, 6-7(4), 7-6(3), 6-4.
She was afterwards told that it had been the longest WTA main-draw match of the season so far: She laughed sarcastically: “What an honour!”
She added: “My mental side wasn’t really tough, I have to say. It was always, like, a good point and I was up mentally, and then it was a bad point, and I was down. That was almost all match.”
The stats proved the point: 66 winners to 78 unforced errors and 18 double faults.
Also through, and with rather less trouble, are No5 seed Karolina Pliskova, who will now play No32 seed Shuai Zhang. Neither dropped a set in their openers. At the other end of this half, world No1, Simona Halep, beat Pliskova’s sister, Karolina, 6-4, 6-4. She will play yet another teenage American wild card, Caroline Dolehide, who beat No30 seed, Dominika Cibulkova after losing the first set.
No6 seed Jelena Ostapenko survived a strong challenge from former No7 Belinda Bencic, who is working her way back from injury, 6-4, 3-6, 6-1, and will now play Petra Martic, who beat No25 seed, Barbora Strycova in straight sets.