World No 1 and top seed Aryna Sabalenka survived an almighty scare against Naomi Osaka at the Madrid Open, fighting back from a set and a break down to progress to the quarter-finals.
The Belarusian’s usual prowess in tiebreaks deserted her as she lost the first set on a lopsided breaker, 7-6(1), before falling 2-1 down in the second set after two mammoth games.
But she regained her composure to break back to love for 2-2, aided by an Osaka double fault, and broke again for 5-3 from 40-0 down on her way to levelling the match.
Errors began to creep into Osaka’s game in a frustrating third set, while Sabalenka was near-faultless on serve, dropping just three points, and she ran away with the decider – sealing it with an ace – to post a 6-7(1), 6-3, 6-2 win in two hours and 20 minutes.
The result keeps her hopes of defending her title and winning a fourth trophy in the Spanish capital alive.
Sabalenka said afterwards: “Oh my God, that was incredible level. She played incredible tennis. I feel like I just got lucky in a couple shots in the third set, that’s why it went that fast.”
“I think I just dropped my level at the end of the first set and gave her that tiebreak quite easily, but overall I’m happy with my performance. When someone put me under pressure, I was able to pull out really incredible shots and incredible tennis. So I’m happy.
“I’m happy that she actually brought that fight, just so I could fight through it, I could struggle a little bit, and find a solution in the match.”
The top seed will face 30th seed Hailey Baptiste in the quarter-finals for the second consecutive WTA 1000 tournament, after the American came through a three-set tussle of her own with Switzerland’s Belinda Bencic.
Baptiste won 6-1, 6-7(14), 6-3 in two hours and 42 minutes but missed six match points in the second set, including five in an epic tiebreak – the longest first-to-seven tour-level tiebreak since Palermo 2024.
The American served a series of three double faults at 6-5 and another two at match point, before a third at 11-11 in the tiebreak, whereupon she smashed her racquet in fury.
But after being taken to a decider by the 11th seed she regained composure to set up a second meeting with Sabalenka, who she lost to 6-4, 6-4 in the quarter-finals in Miami last month.
She said: “The tiebreak was insane. It was quite obvious that nerves got a bit in the way when I had some moments to close out the match, but that’s obviously a part of the game. I wasn’t able to get out of that tiebreak, but I was able to turn it around in the third set, so I can be happy about that. Super easy to just leave the match mentally after something like that.
“Six match points? Outrageous. Having six chances — painful, very, very painful to not get out of that. Then you just start to think, is she going to turn this match around and have that victorious win? I think I told myself that I wasn’t going to allow that.”
