By Chris Oddo | Thursday, August 7, 2014

 

Maria Sharapova couldn't overcome 49 unforced errors against Carla Suarez Navarro in Montreal and fell in three sets.

Photo Source: Streeter Lecka/ Getty  

The match was a rain-interrupted ordeal for Maria Sharapova. For Carla Suarez Navarro, it was the time of her life.

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The Spaniard waited out two long rain delays and survived 19 break points against the gritty Russian to emerge victorious, 6-2, 4-6, 6-2, approximately six hours after the match began. The victory is Suarez Navarro’s 40th of the season, and her third against the top ten.

Seemingly headed for a straight-sets victory, Suarez Navarro encountered a bit of turbulence in the form of a Maria Sharapova fightback in the second set, as the Russian reeled off four consecutive games to force a decider.

But the Spaniard didn’t lose her way, she won the final three games of the match after the final rain delay to close out one of her biggest wins of the season.

Sharapova’s 49 unforced errors no doubt played a role in the upset, as the sixth seed had difficulty finding her range, and even her comeback attempt yielded to more sloppy play in the final set.

"I thought my opponent played a really good match," Sharapova told WTAtour.com. "I couldn't find my rhythm from the beginning of the match. Even though I started feeling a little better, it wasn't enough in the end."

But credit Suarez Navarro, who seems well-suited to Montreal’s high bouncing hard courts. She was persistent about giving Sharapova plenty of different looks in the form of angles, paces and spins, and when she faced difficulties, she held her nerve, eventually closing the affair in two hours and 21 minutes.

Sharapova wasn’t the only top ten seed—or former Grand Slam champion—to fall on Thursday, as second-seeded Petra Kvitova fell victim to Ekaterina Makarova in an all-lefty battle, 6-4, 1-6, 6-2.

Makarova improves to 2-3 against Kvitova, and moves on to face either Jelena Jankovic or CoCo Vandeweghe in the quarterfinals.

Suarez Navarro will face either Venus Williams or Angelique Kerber.

Notes, Numbers>>>

Suarez Navarro is the second WTA player to reach the 40-win mark. Ana Ivanovic was the first.

Sharapova’s best Rogers Cup performance was runner-up in 2009. She has won seven of her last eight titles on clay.

Makarova’s defeat of Petra Kvitova was her seventh top five win. Four of those have come in 2014.