DUBAI, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai lost here on Tuesday in a neck-on-neck match against Bulgarian player Tsvetana Pironkova in the second round of the women's annual Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships.

Amid sunny weather with temperatures above 25 degrees Celsius in Dubai during the day, Peng, a semi-finalist of last year's U.S. Open, won the first set 6-3, but lost the following set with 6-4 while the third set ended in a breath taking tie-break which Peng lost 7-6.

The Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships WTA event continues until February 21. Then the ATP tournament continues between February 23 and 28 which stars world number one Novak Djokovic, defending Dubai champion Roger Federer and Australian Open runner- up Andy Murray.