Today's Edition
Dubai (Aletihad)
It was a day of the qualifiers as Isabella Shinikova and Ksenia Zaytseva knocked off the top two seeds at the 26th Al Habtoor Tennis Challenge on Thursday.
Shinikova took an hour and 50 minutes to pack off top seed Viktoria Hruncakova 7-6 (5), 1-6, 6-3, while Zaytseva was on an effortless mode sending 2021 champion and former junior Wimbledon winner Daria Snigur back home 6-3, 6-2 in exactly one hour.
In the day's top attraction, Great Britain's Heather Watson brushed off former multiple doubles Grand Slam champion Kristina Mladenovic 6-1, 6-2.
Watson, the junior US Open champion in 2008, was ruthless in her approach throughout the 90 minutes on court against a French opponent, who can be crafty and smooth as displayed in Mladenovic's win against former world No. 2 Vera Zvonareva, on Tuesday.
Barring a minor blip towards the end that resulted in four match points being saved by her opponent, Watson matched her Dubai record with a second quarter-final appearance here. "I think I played really well from the beginning to the end to get the job done," Watson said.
"That first game went on for a good 12 minutes of intense tennis, and I think I did well to keep my concentration intact. It wasn't that I did anything wrong. It is just that she was super aggressive. I had to just hang in there and play my game."
Anastasia Tikhonova took the final quarter-final slot on offered with a sturdy 7-6 (3), 6-4 win against Britain's Emily Appleton.
The quarter-finals are now set with Shinikova taking on Nigina Abduraimova and Anastasia Tikhonova facing Yuliya Hatouka in the upper half of the draw, while Watson will run into hard-hitting third seed Rebecca Sramkova and Zaytseva will be up against Arianne Hartono from the Netherlands.
After knocking out the top seed Hruncakova, Shinikova said: "I knew I had to give it everything if I wanted to get past her. I am sure my best is yet to come." Zaytseva, who also came through the qualifiers, was happy to be among the last eight in the singles.
"The idea this week is to just go out there and enjoy my game. I think today I just served well and I pushed her, and things got hard for her [Snigur] as the match progressed," Zaytseva said.
Meanwhile in the doubles, the second-seeded pair of Hruncakova and Dalila Jakupovic brushed off local girl Stefania Bojica and Ekaterina Yashina 6-1, 6-0 to ease into the semi-finals to set up a meeting with the British duo of Olivia Nicholls and Watson.
And in the last match of the day, multiple Grand Slam champions Timea Babos and Vera Zvonareva also booked their place in the semi-finals with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Elena Pridankina and Ksenia Zaytseva and earned the right to meet Prarthana Thombare and Anastasia Kovaleva.
