Chan Yung-jan was the victor in the Taiwanese showdown at the Aegon Open in Nottingham, England, yesterday as she claimed a spot in the doubles semi-finals.
Second seeds Chan and Zheng Jie of China defeated Taiwan’s Chuang Chia-jung and Olga Savchuk of Ukraine 6-4, 6-4 in the quarter-finals on Court Three at the Nottingham Tennis Centre.
The cross-strait duo saved four of six break-point opportunities and converted all four they created, winning 57 of the 107 points contested to complete the victory in 1 hour, 10 minutes.
Photo: screen grab from Facebook
In today’s semi-finals, the second seeds are due to face either British pairing Jocelyn Rae and Anna Smith or Monica Niculescu of Romania and Arantxa Parra Santonja of Spain, who eliminated Chan’s younger sister, Chan Hao-ching, in the first round on Thursday. They were due to play their semi-final later yesterday.
In today’s other semi-final, Taiwan’s Chan Chin-wei and Xu Yi-fan of China take on top seeds Raquel Kops-Jones and Abigail Spears after the US duo thrashed Shuko Aoyama of Japan and Renata Voracova of the Czech Republic 6-1, 6-1 in their quarter-final on Thursday.
In the singles yesterday, Niculescu advanced to the semi-finals after a testing three-set match with crowd favorite Johanna Konta of Britain.
The Romanian advanced 6-2, 2-6, 6-2 in a topsy-turvy battle lasting 2 hour, 21 minutes on Centre Court.
Niculescu saved three of seven break-point chances and converted six of 20, winning 93 of the 172 points contested to advance to a semi-final against either top seed Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland or Lauren Davis of the US, who were playing their quarter-final later yesterday.
On the other side of the draw, fifth seed Alison Riske of the US was due to take on Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium and qualifier Sachia Vickery of the US was to play Ana Konjuh of Croatia in the other quarter-finals later yesterday.
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