LOS ANGELES: A spiralling injury list on the women's tour has left the US Open in danger of being robbed of many of its major players.

With the final grand slam of the year set to get underway later this month, champion Serena Williams heads a casualty list that is threatening to leave the Open with a seriously depleted women's field.

Five of the WTA's top eight players and nine of its top 20 competitors have pulled out of tournaments during the past three weeks.

"I don't think I have ever seen it this bad," said former top-five player turned television pundit Pam Shriver.

Having grown up just a few kilometres from the tournament's site, the American was counted on to sell tickets at the JP Morgan Classic.

But only 1,814 fans attended Saturday's semi-final between Lindsay Davenport and Japan's Ai Sugiyama in a new stadium that seats 8,000 people.

Seventh-ranked Jennifer Capriati joined the casualty list during last week's Acura Classic with a pectoral strain and was forced to retire midway through her second-round match.

Davenport skipped last month's tournament in Stanford with a left foot injury.

Next week's Canadian Open in Toronto has also been hit with injuries.

Serena's older sister Venus has withdrawn because of an abdominal strain while Monica Seles, Chanda Rubin, Meghann Shaughnessy, Alexandra Stevenson, Patty Schnyder and Anna Pistolesi are the other members of the top 30 to drop out.

Along with Seles, who has not played competitively since her first-round loss at the French Open in May, Russian pin-up Anna Kournikova has also been out of action for months.

Agencies via Xinhua

(China Daily 08/12/2003 page8)