Romanian top seed Simona Halep in action against Ukraine’s Lesia Tsurenko during her round of 16 match of the Qatar Total Open at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex in Doha, yesterday.
Former champion Simona Halep of Romania yesterday eased past Ukraine’s Lesia Tsurenko to storm into the quarter-finals of the Qatar Total Open at Khalifa Tennis Complex.
Winner in 2014, Halep posted a 6-2, 6-3 win in just 1 hour and 19 minutes after completely dominating her 29-year-old rival in the first set. The victory also ensured that Halep, 27, will rise to number two when the new world rankings are released on Monday.
In the quarter-finals, Halep will meet Germany’s Julia Goerges who yesterday beat American Alison Risko 6-1, 6-7, 6-4.
Earlier in the day, Elina Svitolina of Ukraine beat former French Open winner Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia in straight sets to reach the last sight of the tournament. Svitolina, who got a wild card for the six-day tournament, won 6-4, 6-4 in 80 minutes in the day’s first match on Center Court.
Svitolina will meet qualifier Karolina Muchova of Russia in the quarter-finals. Muchova yesterday beat Su-Wei Hsieh of Chinese Taipei 6-2, 6-4.
Also yesterday, Elise Mertens of Belgium beat lucky loser Kristyna Pliskova of Czech Republic 6-2, 7-6 in 1 hour and 47 minutes. Kristyna replaced sister Karolina, the defending champion, who pulled out because of illness yesterday.
In a shock result yesterday, former champion Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain was sent packing by Kiki Bertens of the Netherlands. Bertens won 2-6, 6-1, 6-1 in 84 minutes on Court Number 1.
Barbora Strycova of the Czech Republic beat qualifier Anna Blinkova of Russia 6-6, 3-6, 6-0 in 1 hour and 54 minutes. Strycova fired two aces in her fighting win.
In the last match of the day, Angelique Kerber of Germany beat Estonia’s Anett Kontaveit. Kerber won 6-1, 7-6. Kerber will meet Strycova in the quarter-finals today.
Halep, a former French Open champion, said she was thrilled with the win.
“It was a great recovery in the second set. It was a good match. I am coming from indoors but it is not easy to adjust to outdoors,” Halep said after her match.
“I hit the ball well. It was tough in the second set. I was 3-1 down but I take my time. I just stay focused. I felt I was strong enough to come back,” she added.
When reminded that she will be world number two on Monday, Halep said: “Well, it doesn’t matter. I just play to win every game. When I step on to the court, I just want to see how happy I can be. If I am second now, I will fight to get to number one. But now I just want to win every match.”
Halep said she was delighted to have guided Romania to Fed Cup semi-finals with win over the Czech Republic.
“It was an incredible feeling to win in the tie against the best team in the world,” Halep said.
“They are champions and winning the tie meant a lot. My players were pushing each other. Our captain was great too. We want to win the semi-finals also so ‘let’s go, girls’,” Halep added.
Svitolina, after her win over Ostapenko, yesterday said it was a tough match.
“I think I was striking the ball really good and serving much better than I did in the previous matches against her,” Svitolina said.
“So I think this was the key today. The tricky conditions, the ball is flying and the wind is very tricky, so I had to be extremely quick with my feet. In the end I was very pleased that I could finish in two sets,” she added.
When asked if she was affected by the weather here, Svitolina said: “It’s, as I said, it’s tricky, but, you know, it’s tennis. It’s two players in the same conditions. You have to be ready for this. You have to adjust. Every tournament is very different conditions. Some are flying, some are, you know, the ball is just stopping, so you have to adjust. And this is a part of tennis.”
Bertens, who stunned 2016 champion Navarro, said playing in the cold wave enveloping the Qatari capital for the last few days was a challenge.
“Yeah, it’s a little bit cold here now at night since we played late. So yesterday I played in the leggings just to keep my body warm, and today was just the long sleeves,” Bertens said.
“I just like to keep myself warm. Yeah, against Elise (Mertens), it’s going to be a tough match. We played each other this year already in Brisbane, which was a tough three-setter. And, yeah, we know each other really well. It’s just going to be a challenge tomorrow,” she added.
