Former French Open champion Li Na of China was brought down by third seed Serena Williams of the United States on Wednesday at the WTA Championships here.
Despite that Li gave Williams such frustrations to make the American smash her racket, the 30-year-old Chinese lost her Red group match 7-6 (1), 6-3.
In another Red group encounter, top-ranked Victoria Azarenka of Belarus saved two match points to beat Angelique Kleber of Germany 6-7 (11), 7-6 (2), 6-4 in her first match at the event.
Li was off to a good start when she took the 4-1 lead in the first set but multi-Grand Slam winner and London Olympic champion Williams won the next four games.
Li broke Williams twice although she lost her own serve in the next three games but failed to clinch the tiebreaker.
In the second set, Li was unable to stop Williams and held for two match points before losing the match.
At one point in the match, Williams got so frustrated at dropping serve that she uncharacteristically smashed her racket.
In the White group, second seed Maria Sharapova of Russia rallied to beat No. 4 Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland 5-7, 7-5, 7-5.
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