By Martyn Herman
LONDON, July 5 (Reuters) – Women’s top seed Aryna Sabalenka was knocked out in the fourth round of Wimbledon by an inspired Naomi Osaka on Sunday with the Japanese player blazing to a 6-2 7-6(2) win on Centre Court to blow the women’s draw wide open.
With eight Grand Slam titles between them, the blockbuster duel topped the Day Seven bill but it ended up lacking the expected fireworks as 14th seed Osaka dominated.
Sabalenka was left screaming in frustration during a 32-minute opening set as her power game misfired.
The second set was more like the high-octane contest the crowd had expected but a serene Osaka stayed cool to snap Sabalenka’s streak of 21 unbeaten tiebreaks in Grand Slams and claim her biggest win since returning to the Tour in 2024 following the birth of daughter Shai.
After netting a backhand on match point, world number one Sabalenka took her anger out on a ball, blasting it high out of the Centre Court.
Osaka’s win not only took her into the quarter-finals of Wimbledon for the first time, it left the women’s draw intriguingly poised heading into week two with no clear favourite. Next she will face 10th seed Karolina Muchova whose win over fellow Czech Barbora Krejcikova guaranteed a ninth successive first-time women’s champion at the All England Club.
“I think it was a really fun match. I’m really grateful for this. Even if I lost, I would still think it was a great match,” Osaka said after her first victory on Centre Court.
“I mean it’s been a long time since I’ve had so much fun on the court. To do it here, it really means a lot. I lost to her like three times in a row, so that really sucked.
“So I wanted to turn it over.”
GET DRUNK AND FORGET ABOUT TENNIS
After third-round defeats for defending champion Iga Swiatek and second seed Elena Rybakina on Saturday, the door seemed to have swung wide open for Sabalenka following three successive semi-final runs, but she was well below her best.
“Now I want to go and get drunk and forget about tennis,” the still-sweating 28-year-old said after arriving at her press conference minutes after walking off court.
Both players are better known as hardcourt specialists, with four Grand Slams apiece on that surface.
Born seven months apart, their careers have taken very different trajectories with Osaka winning all of her four Slams before the slightly younger Sabalenka found her groove and captured her first at the 2023 Australian Open.
Since Osaka beat Sabalenka on her way to the 2018 U.S. Open title, they had gone almost eight years without facing each other. They are finally back in the same orbit though and met at this year’s French Open where Sabalenka prevailed.
Osaka has once again caused a buzz with her Japanese-inspired walk-on outfits but it is her dazzling tennis that is now beginning to really turn heads.
She was first to the punch from the start on Sunday, the quality of her service returns continually catching Sabalenka off balance as she broke twice to take the first set.
Sabalenka tried everything to fire herself up, banging her racket against her head early in the second set, but despite keeping pace she rarely looked in control and seemed to be battling herself as much as Osaka.
Osaka simply maintained her serving accuracy and crisp ball striking from the back of the court and even with Sabalenka’s ominous record in tiebreaks, she did not flinch.
“I wasn’t really thinking about my tiebreak record at all,” Sabalenka said. “As I said, what could I do if the person is acing and hitting the lines, going for her shots without fear?
“I was really battling myself. She was just going for it.”
(Reporting by Martyn Herman, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
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