Two-time Indian Wells champion Iga Swiatek on Thursday avenged her shock Paris Olympics loss to Zheng Qinwen with a 6-3, 6-3 win over the Chinese eighth seed, setting up a semi-final against 17-year-old Russian Mirra Andreeva in the California desert.
In the men’s singles, Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz put on a show with his acrobatic shotmaking under the lights to close out the day’s action, overcoming a 4-1 second-set deficit to defeat Francisco Cerundolo 6-3, 7-6 (7/4), while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei crashed out of the women’s doubles.
Swiatek, one of the gold medal favorites when she lost to eventual champion Zheng in the Paris semi-finals last year, converted all five of her break points during a 94-minute match that was interrupted multiple times to dry the court.
Photo: EPA-EFE
“At the end it got really windy, which made it super tricky, especially when the conditions change during the match you need to adjust quickly and it’s not that easy,” Swiatek said. “It was a weird match with all the breaks and everything, but I wanted to be composed and really focused, and I’m glad that I did that.”
Up next for defending champion Swiatek, who has dropped just 12 games across her four matches, is Andreeva after the ninth seed’s 7-5, 6-3 win over Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina.
Andreeva beat Swiatek convincingly en route to the title in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, last month and is the youngest woman to reach the semi-finals at Indian Wells since Maria Sharapova in 2005.
The Russian continued to live up to the hype around her, playing a relentless brand of tennis to extend her winning streak to 10 matches.
Top seed Aryna Sabalenka hit a sensational running backhand winner on match point to beat Liudmila Samsonova 6-2, 6-3 and set up an Australian Open final rematch with American Madison Keys, who steamrolled Belinda Bencic 6-1, 6-1.
“I’m really excited,” Sabalenka said of the opportunity to play Keys again after falling to her in three sets in Melbourne in January. “I really hope I can do a little bit better than I did in Australia.”
Daniil Medvedev jumped for joy in an uncharacteristically emotional celebration after holding off Frenchman Arthur Fils 6-4, 2-6, 7-6 (9/7) amid gusting winds.
The Russian took advantage of 19 unforced errors from Fils in the first set, but the 20-year-old showed maturity beyond his years in the second, using backhand slices and making frequent trips to the net to level the match.
Momentum swings were frequent in the deciding set and tiebreak, and Fils smashed his racket after sending a volley long facing match point.
“The adrenaline got me going,” Medvedev told reporters. “I jumped next to him. Then I was, like, sorry man, I usually don’t celebrate like this, but it’s okay, it can happen.”
Next up for the fifth seed is Dane Holger Rune, who beat Dutchman Tallon Griekspoor 5-7, 6-0, 6-3.
Two-time defending champion Alcaraz next faces Jack Draper after the Briton dispatched Ben Shelton of the US 6-4, 7-5 in a battle of lefties.
Alcaraz, who has said Indian Wells is his favorite tournament outside of Spain, wondered if he should make his home away from home official after winning his 16th consecutive match in the desert.
“Should I buy a house here?” he wrote on the TV camera lens after his victory.
In the women’s doubles, Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and her Chinese partner Zhang Shuai saw their hopes of the title dashed after losing in straight sets in the semi-finals.
The fifth-seeded Taiwanese-Chinese duo lost 7-5, 6-3 to the unseeded duo of Tereza Mihalikova of Slovakia and Olivia Nicholls of Britain in a match that lasted 90 minutes.
Hsieh and Zhang were unable to take advantage of key opportunities, cashing in on only one of seven break points, while their opponents only had four break points, but won three of them.
The fifth seeds struggled early, but rallied to even the first set at 5-5 before stumbling.
They made less of an impact in the second set as their opponents continued to show more consistency in all facets of the game.
Hsieh won the women’s doubles title at Indian Wells with former partner Elise Mertens of Belgium last year.
Additional reporting by staff writer, with CNA
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