Britain’s Sonay Kartal thumped two-time Grand Slam finalist Jasmine Paolini to reach the quarter-finals of the Wuhan Open.
Kartal has made a brilliant return from six months out with a back injury and dropped only two games in a 6-2 6-0 victory against 15th seed Paolini.
It was an error-strewn performance from former French Open and Wimbledon runner-up Paolini and Kartal took full advantage, winning the final 11 games.
The result equals the 24-year-old’s best performance at a WTA 1000 tournament – the top level of the women’s tour – with Kartal also having reached the last eight in Beijing last year.
“From my side it was a pretty flawless performance so I’m very happy with that one,” said Kartal in her on-court interview.
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Kartal’s performances this week have put her on the verge of a swift return to the top 100 and she will next face fifth seed Elina Svitolina.
Svitolina broke Guo Hanyu’s serve in the opening and final games of the match to beat the Chinese wild card 6-1 6-4.
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Surprise French Open runner-up Maja Chwalinska is also through to the quarter-finals after a 6-4 6-1 win over American Iva Jovic.
“I think it was quite a solid match from my side,” Chwalinska said in her post-match press conference. “Iva is an amazing player. I knew that I needed to play my best game to get a win today.
“I think we had many very challenging rallies and it was a very physical match, I think, even though the score maybe doesn’t show it, but it was definitely a very hard match.”
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Diana Shnaider defeated sixth seed and Wimbledon finalist Karolina Muchova 7-5 6-3.
Zverev reaches Shanghai Masters semi-finals
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Top-ranked Alexander Zverev, whohas been carrying an ankle injury, said he felt good on-court after beating Alex de Minaur 6-4 6-4 at the Shanghai Masters.
The German made 80 per cent of his first serves and saved all five of the break points he faced as he set up a semi-final meeting with Alejandro Davidovich Fokina.
“I felt both of us were playing really, really well. I was a lot of times outhitting Alex, which is difficult to do from the baseline because he is so fast and he loves this kind of court speed here,” said Zverev, who secured the year-end No 1 ranking earlier this week.
“I felt good and I’m happy with the step up from the last couple of matches.”
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