Dubai: Sorana Cirstea was disappointed but still departed with a lot of positives after her quarter-final exit at the Dubai Duty Free Women’s Open late on Thursday.
Cirstea lost in straight sets 6-1, 6-2 to former world No 1 Caroline Wozniacki.
The Romanian, ranked 27 in the world, had a slow start to the season with first-round exits in Auckland, Sydney and the Australian Open. However, she made the last eight at the Pattaya City Open earlier this month before losing to Karolina Pliskova.
“I think it was a positive week,” she said of her Dubai experience. “I had two good wins against [Roberta] Vinci and [Sara] Errani — both are top 15 players. I think it’s been a good week. I have been getting better from week to week this year, which is nice to see, because it took me a little bit to get the rhythm.
“But I think it’s starting to get better. Today [Thursday] was a bad day, but I’m not going to forget all of the positive things that happened this week.”
Cirstea was left pondering whether or not playing during the day led to her disappointing performance against Wozniacki.
“I actually haven’t played a day match since Australia, so it’s been more than a month,” she said. “I played only night sessions at Pattaya, then one Fed Cup indoors, Doha only night sessions, here only night session. So I was struggling to actually see the ball and I was not getting the timing right, but I still don’t think that was the key factor.
“I went into the match with maybe higher expectations. I didn’t really get a chance to get fully into the match. It did not go as I hoped it would, but it’s a learning process. Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn. I’m going to try to work harder after this loss.”
Next on the agenda for the 23-year-old Bucharest resident will be the hard-court season in America. “Now I have about ten days or even more of good practice and then go to Indian Wells and Miami with a positive head and clear mind,” she said. “I think that’s very important.”
