RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) 鈥� Jessica Pegula withdrew from her last match at the WTA Finals because of a left knee injury on Wednesday.
The American, who lost her first two matches and was already eliminated from semifinal contention at the season-ending tournament, will be replaced in the Orange Group by first alternate and ninth-ranked Daria Kasatkina.
The sixth-ranked Pegula, who was scheduled to play second-ranked Iga Swiatek on Thursday in her last round-robin match, said she decided to withdraw because she was not feeling 鈥渃omfortable moving on court.鈥�
鈥淛ust been kind of struggling with a little bit of an injury, and for whatever reason, it kind of really flared up this week. Not really sure why," the sixth-ranked Pegula said. 鈥淚n the few days before practice, it felt really, really good, but it started creeping up right before my first match.鈥�
Pegula lost to Coco Gauff and Barbora Krejcikova.
Swiatek still has a chance to join Gauff as the other semifinalist from the group. A win over Kasatkina combined with a win by Gauff over Krejcikova would send Swiatek into her third straight WTA Finals semifinal.
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AP tennis:
The Associated Press
