HONG KONG: Garbine Muguruza shrugged off a rain delay to sweep through to the quarter-finals of the Hong Kong Open yesterday in confident style - 6-2, 6-1.
The Spanish former Wimbledon and French Open champion brushed aside Romania’s Ana Bogdan with the loss of only three games to underline her status as one of the tournament favourites.
Torrential downpours delayed the start of play by more than four hours and the world number 13 did not come out on court until 10.21pm, but said she had remained focused on the game during the extended build-up.
Earlier, eighth seed Alize Cornet went down to Thailand’s Luksika Kumkhum after a drama-filled clash which saw both players struggle to hold their serve while Kristina Kucova, who caused an upset Monday after she knocked out Jelena Ostapenko, glided through her match with Viktoriya Tomova 6-1, 6-0.
China’s leading ladies will be bidding to join Muguruza in the quarter-finals when they play today.
Wang Qiang, 26, and Zhang Shuai, 29, said confidence was now growing among Chinese players after a quiet spell since trailblazer Li Na, a two-time major-winner, retired in 2014.
Example
The pair added that Li’s shining example and the explosion of tournaments in China after her Grand Slam wins had triggered the emergence of a new generation of players.
Wang Qiang, ranked 24th, and 40th-placed Zhang head a list of four Chinese players in the current top 100, and there are 11 in the top 200 including 17-year-old US Open junior champion Wang Xiyu.
“Li Na has given us all a lot of hope,” Zhang said.
“When she won the Grand Slams I think more people decided to try tennis and try to believe in themselves.”
She added: “Now we have so many tournaments in China I think a lot of young players have more opportunities to make a higher ranking.”
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