Tennis news - Elina Svitolina eases past Garbine Muguruza in Dubai
ByPA Sport
Updated 20/02/2019 at 22:43 GMT
Two-time defending champion Elina Svitolina stayed on course for a hat-trick of titles at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships with a dominant third-round win over Garbine Muguruza.
Dubai Tennis
Image credit: PA Sport
Sixth seed Svitolina needed only 62 minutes to defeat two-time grand slam champion Muguruza 6-1 6-2 and set up a quarter-final clash with Carla Suarez Navarro, who knocked out Naomi Osaka’s conqueror Kristina Mladenovic 7-5 7-5.
Hsieh Su-wei caused the big upset of the day, defeating fifth seed Angelique Kerber 5-7 6-4 6-0, losing just nine points in the third set.
Aryna Sabalenka also failed to make the last eight, the eighth seed seeing six match points come and go before Belinda Bencic took her first to win 6-4 2-6 7-6 (7).
Osaka is guaranteed to hold on to the world number-one spot this week but Petra Kvitova, Simona Halep and Karolina Pliskova can all close the gap.
Second seed Kvitova was taken to three sets by American qualifier Jennifer Brady before coming through 7-5 1-6 6-3 while Halep defeated Lesia Tsurenko 6-3 7-5 and Pliskova survived two tie-breaks against Alison Riske.
Slovakia’s Viktoria Kuzmova won the battle of the 20-year-olds 1-6 7-5 6-2 against American Sofia Kenin and will face Kvitova next.
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