World No. 5 Agnieszka Radwanska won two matches yesterday to advance to the quarter-finals of a rain-interrupted BMW Malaysian Open.
The player, who was wearing a thigh strap, will meet Taiwanese qualifier Hsieh Su-wei today for a berth in the semi-finals.
The Pole beat Akgul Amanmuradova, who she was originally scheduled to play on Tuesday, 6-2, 6-4 in her first match of the day, before easing past Karolina Pliskova, 6-4, 6-4.
While results went Radwanska’s way, it was the end of the road for fourth seed Jarmila Gajdosova and seventh seed Jelena Dokic.
Radwanska was in cruise control against Pliskova of the Czech Republic in the second round, but admitted it was hard waiting just to finish off her first-round match.
“Playing two matches [in one day] is bad, especially under these conditions. The weather really hasn’t been helping the progress of the tournament,” Radwanska said.
Radwanska came to Kuala Lumpur after winning in Dubai on Saturday, a victory which saw her reach a career high on the WTA rankings.
“I’ve not had much rest too, as I have been playing for several weeks now. My shoulder feels sore as a result of this, but hopefully it is not too bad. But the thigh strap is just a precaution,” she said.
Rain forced her Tuesday match against Amanmuradova to be postponed and it was then called off on Wednesday with the score at 6-2, 3-3.
When play resumed yesterday, Radwanska was fired up to finish and took just 20 minutes to close out the match.
Meanwhile, defending champion Dokic threw away a one-set-and-4-2-up lead against fellow Australian Olivia Rogowska to lose in three. Rogowska held her nerve, despite facing some punishing groundstrokes, to grind out a 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (7/2) victory.
“It was one of those frustrating days where I couldn’t play my best tennis,” Dokic said. “It was a game I should have won easily.”
A delighted Rogowska will now face Eleni Daniilido, who upset Gajdosova of Australia 6-4, 6-0 for a place in the semis. Third seed Peng Shuai of China also reached the quarter-finals yesterday and will meet fifth seed Petra Martic of Croatia.
The US$220,000 BMW Malaysian Open ends on Sunday.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later