Osaka given free passage into Qatar Open quarter-finals

Naomi Osaka was given free passage through to the quarter-finals at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open after opponent Lesia Tsurenko withdrew because of injury ahead of their scheduled contest.

Osaka, who returned to the tour in January following the birth of daughter Shai last summer, is now through to the last eight at a tournament for the first time in nearly two years.

The four-time Grand Slam champion had won only one of her first four matches of the year prior to heading to Doha.

Stream live tennis and more with NOW I Get Sky SportsEmma Raducanu plans to miss Dubai I Marion Bartoli: A lot of work needs to be doneWhen will Emma Raducanu return to action on Sky Sports Tennis?But the Japanese player has hit form in the Qatari capital, reversing her Australian Open loss to Caroline Garcia in the first round and then defeating Croat Petra Martic.

It is her best run since she reached the final of the Miami Open in April 2022, losing to Iga Swiatek.

Osaka ends last-eight wait in Qatar

Osaka, who was on maternity leave for the end of 2022 and all of 2023, is into her first WTA Tour quarter-final since she reached the Miami Open final in March of 2022

Currently ranked No 747, Osaka is the second-lowest-ranked woman to reach a WTA 1000 quarter-final. Sloane Stephens, who was ranked No 934 when she made the 2017 Toronto semi-finals, still holds that record

In the quarter-finals, two-time WTA 1000 title winner Osaka will face Karolina Pliskova, who recorded her seventh victory in seven consecutive days – four in Europe and three in Asia – as she beat fellow Czech Linda Noskova 3-6 7-5 6-1.

Top seed Iga Swiatek booked her spot in the final eight with a 6-1, 6-4 victory over 14th seed Ekaterina Alexandrova.

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Iga Swiatek strolled past Ekaterina Alexandrova in Doha to book a third straight quarter-final spot at the Qatar Open

She will now face the winner of Victoria Azarenka and eighth seed Jelena Ostapenko in the quarter-finals.

Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova’s difficult start to the year continued with a 7-5 6-3 loss to Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, while Australian Open runner-up Zheng Qinwen was beaten 7-5 6-3 by former US Open runner-up Leylah Fernandez.

The result was Fernandez’s sixth career top-10 win, and second in the past four months following her defeat of Vondrousova in last November’s Billie Jean King Cup semi-finals.

Fernandez will next face Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina after she improved to 13-2 in 2024 with a sixth consecutive victory, beating Emma Navarro 6-1 6-7 (6-8) 6-4.

Rybakina has now made the quarter-finals of four of the five events she has entered at the start of a WTA season for the second time in her career after 2020.

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