Last year’s mixed doubles champions Hsieh Su-wei of Taiwan and Poland’s Jan Zielinski on Monday crashed out of the quarter-finals at Wimbledon, leaving the Taiwanese star focused on pursuing a fifth women’s doubles title in London, while a partner injury forced compatriot Chan Hao-ching to give up on her doubles campaign.
Hsieh and Zielinksi, who last year also won the Australia Open title, narrowly lost their opening set 7-6 (9/7), before Britain’s Joe Salisbury and Brazil’s Luisa Stefani stunned the former champions 6-3 at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club.
The Taiwanese-Polish duo had been dominant in the first two rounds, blasting past Argentine Maximo Gonzalez and Spaniard Cristina Bucsa 6-3, 6-4 on Saturday, before toppling fourth seeds Evan King and Taylor Townsend of the US 6-4, 5-7, 6-3 on Sunday.
Photo: Reuters
While Hsieh’s mixed doubles run is over, her women’s doubles campaign remains alive. She and Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko are today to play Sorana Cirstea of Romania and Russia’s Anna Kalinskaya in the women’s quarter-finals.
Fourth seeds Hsieh and Ostapenko on Sunday dominated 14th seeds Zhang Shuai of China and Russia’s Ekaterina Alexandrova 6-4, 6-0 in the third round.
Hsieh won the women’s doubles title at Wimbledon in 2023, 2021, 2019 and 2013.
Photo: Reuters
Compatriot Chan was forced to give up her Wimbledon campaign after her injury-plagued partner Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic pulled out following a tearful women’s singles defeat on Saturday.
After Chan and Krecikova on Wednesday last week defeated Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan and the US’ Peyton Stearns 7-6 (7/5), 6-2, the pair on Friday earned a massive boost in upsetting French Open champions and third seeds Jasmine Paolini and Sara Errani.
The 6-3, 6-2 victory in just 1 hour, 10 minutes was a touch of revenge over the Italian stars, who in October last year denied Chan and Russian Veronika Kudermetova the China Open title.
However, Chan and Krecikova’s momentum was cut short on Saturday, when last year’s women’s singles champion Krejcikova, who has been plagued by back problems, succumbed to illness during her 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 defeat to 10th seed American Emma Navarro. Krejcikova appeared unsteady and was sobbing at points in the match and needed treatment from a doctor.
As a result, it was unsurprising that she was unable to compete in Monday’s third-round match, ending Chan’s doubles ambitions and handing 16th seeds Caroline Dolehide and Sofia Kenin of the US a walkover to the quarter-finals.
Chan and mixed doubles partner Andre Goransson of Sweden exited in the first round on Saturday, with a 6-4, 6-1 defeat to second seeds Zhang and Marcelo Arevalo of Argentina.
Meanwhile, 12th seeds Wu Fang-hsien of Taiwan and Jiang Xinyu of China, who in January won the Auckland Open and the Hobart International, crashed out of the women’s doubles in the second round, with a 6-2, 6-1 loss to Desirae Krawczyk of the US and Olivia Gadecki of Australia.
On Friday, Wu and mixed doubles partner Sadio Doumbia of France crashed out of the opening round with a 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 loss to Krawczyk and Neal Skupski of the UK.
In men’s singles, world No. 1 Jannik Sinner on Monday advanced to the quarter-finals after a tearful Grigor Dimitrov pulled out injured while in total control of the match.
The Italian was staring at the exit door trailing 3-6, 5-7, 2-2 before the Bulgarian 19th seed pulled up holding his right pectoral muscle and was unable to continue.
Sinner rushed to his aid, but his 34-year-old opponent was barely able to wave to acknowledge the crowd’s warm ovation.
“Honestly I don’t know what to say,” Sinner said. “He is an incredible player, I think we all saw this today. He’s been so unlucky in the past couple of years. An incredible player, a good friend of mine also. We understand each other very well off the court too. Seeing him in this position, honestly, if there would be a chance that he could play the next round, he would deserve it.”
Novak Djokovic survived Australian 11th seed Alex de Minaur in a 1-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 scare to advance to set up a last-eight match against Italian 22nd seed Flavio Cobolli, who beat former Wimbledon runner-up Marin Cilic 6-4, 6-4, 6-7 (4/7), 7-6 (7/3).
In the women’s draw, Iga Swiatek continued her serene progress with a 6-4, 6-1 rout of Danish 23rd seed Clara Tauson, while Russian seventh seed Mirra Andreeva, 18, reached the Wimbledon quarter-finals for the first time with a 6-2, 6-3 win over Navarro.
Additional reporting by AFP and Reuters
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