Wozniacki loses in Indian Wells as Halep advances
Del Potro dumps Ferrer, Cilic crashes out
INDIANA WELLS: Caroline Wozniacki blew any chance she had to overtake Simona Halep as world number one after losing 6-4 7-5 to Darya Kasatkina in the fourth round of the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells on Tuesday. While Halep overcame a sluggish start to beat Wang Qiang 7-5 6-1, Australian Open champion Wozniacki fell to the same player who knocked her out of last month’s St. Petersburg Ladies Open. “I’m just going on court and actually now enjoying every minute during I’m playing,” 20th seed Kasatkina told reporters. “And, yeah, I’m playing (my) best matches against the best players. But as I say, if you want to be on the top, you have to beat the top players. So quite simple rule.” Facing Kasatkina in the quarters will be No. 10 seed Angelique Kerber, who easily defeated Caroline Garcia 6-1 6-1. In the men’s Juan Martin Del Potro continued his dominance over David Ferrer to book a spot in the Indian Wells fourth round as second seed Marin Cilic suffered a shock loss. World No. 8 Del Potro extended his win streak over the Spaniard to five straight matches, winning 6-4, 7-6 (7/3) at the ATP Tour hardcourt tournament here Tuesday.
The 29-year-old Del Potro improved to 7-6 overall against Ferrer and his five consecutive victories date back to the 2013 Wimbledon quarter-finals. “We always play tough matches. I got lucky,” said Del Potro. “I played really well in the tiebreak and served well in the important moments.”
Del Potro will next face fellow Argentinian Leonardo Mayer, who defeated Japanese qualifier Taro Daniel 64, 6-1. Del Potro is playing some of his best tennis in years as he improved to 13-3 on the season. In January he returned the top 10 for the first time since 2014.
He is fresh off winning his 21st career title earlier this month in Acapulco when he steamrolled his way into the final by beating three top 10 players in a row. He capped off his Acapulco run by beating South Africa’s Kevin Anderson 6-4, 6-4 in the championship game. Earlier on Tuesday, Halep booked a quarter-final place against Petra Martic after getting the better of China’s Wang. The turning point came after a string of unforced errors left Halep trailing 5-4 in the first set, prompting coach Darren Cahill to tell the defensive specialist to work longer points and reduce the error count. Halep went on to lose only one more game. The 26year-old Romanian showed no sign of the foot injury that forced her to withdraw from the Qatar Total Open in Doha last month and is well positioned to make a run at reclaiming the Indian Wells title she won in 2015. First she will have to get past unseeded Croatian Martic, who advanced to the last eight with a 6-3 7-6(4) win against Marketa Vondrousova.
“She is a very tough opponent because she is serving pretty strong and also the forehand has a lot of top spin ... So I will have to work hard,” Halep told the Tennis Channel. A day after beating her sister Serena, Venus Williams moved past Anastasija Sevastova 76(6) 6-4 and will next face Carla Suarez Navarro, who defeated Danielle Collins 6-2 6-4.
Former world number one Karolina Pliskova used her
Pliskova defeats 16-year-old Anisimova
powerful serve to overwhelm 16-year-old Amanda Anisimova and reach the quarter-finals for the third year in a row. Pliskova’s 6-1 7-6(2) win ended the run of the young American, a wild card who beat ninth seed Petra Kvitova in the third round for the biggest win of her fledgling career. Pliskova will face 20-year-old Naomi Osaka of Japan, who defeated Maria Sakkari 6-1 5-7 6-1 to reach her first Indian Wells quarter-final. —Agencies