Zhang Shuai's dream run at Wimbledon came to an end on Wednesday when the Chinese tennis ace and her partner John Peers of Australia failed to reach the fourth round of the mixed doubles after biting the dust against Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia and Sweden's Robert Lindstedt. The fourth-seeded pair lost 6-2, 5-7, 4-6 in a hard-fought three-setter.

Earlier, Zhang had made it to the last eight in the women's singles after edging past Dayana Yastremska of Ukraine 6-4, 1-6, 6-2 on Monday and thus, reached the quarterfinal stage of a singles tournament at a Grand Slam for the first time in her career.

Alongside Li Na, Zheng Jie and Peng Shuai, Zhang is one of only four Chinese tennis players to have reached the quarterfinals in Grand Slam singles till date.

However, the Chinese player's fairytale run in the singles was over on Tuesday, when she was outclassed by seventh-seeded Simona Halep of Romania 6-4, 1-6, 6-2. Then her campaign was taking a shape in the mixed doubles as Zhang and Peers had reached the semifinals of U.S. Open last year. But their efforts of making it better this year came a cropper at the All England Club.

After her heart-breaking defeat an emotional Zhang said, "My desire for victory has not changed. And I am becoming more mature at dealing with successes and failures."

Before Wimbledon, Tianjin-born Zhang practiced on grass courts for three weeks instead of returning home and was gearing up for a better performance on the hallowed grass of SW19. She admitted that she had not felt fully comfortable on the surface which was not natural to her style of play in the past. 

Her record at the All England Club has been quite lackluster as she had been stopped five times in the first round of the year's third major since 2011.

"I'm just enjoying my stay in England. I've put my best foot forward and I'm happy to reach the last eight at Wimbledon. Next year I'll do better," the Chinese conceded.

Interestingly, Zhang's eye-catching progress at Wimbledon came after she made a breakthrough earlier this year at the Australian Open, when she teamed up with local favorite Samantha Stosur to win the women's doubles and bag her first Grand Slam title.

The remarkable victory in the final at Melbourne Park against defending champions Tímea Babos and Kristina Mladenovic also helped her top become the fourth player from mainland China to win a women's doubles title at a major, after Zheng Jie, Yan Zi and Peng Shuai.

Zhang had won her first singles match in a Grand Slam tournament at the 2016 Australian Open, when, as a qualifier, she defeated the then world No. 2 Simona Halep en route to the quarterfinals. That magic run also marked an end to her erstwhile lackluster record of losing all 14 of her main-draw Grand Slam matches starting since the 2008 U.S. Open.