Osaka cruises to semifinals
Naomi Osaka may have survived a scare in her fourth round match in Melbourne, but one wouldn’t have known it on Tuesday.
Osaka cruised to a quick win over Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei in straight sets, 6-2, 6-2, in her quarterfinal matchup at Rod Laver Arena at the Australian Open.
Osaka, the world No. 3, split her first two sets with Hsieh before going on a quick three game run — which she solidified with an ace after getting into a tight battle with Hsieh at the end of the fifth game — to take a 4-1 lead in the first set. From there, she quickly pushed to take the 6-2 win and win the first set.
With the momentum in hand, Osaka rolled to a quick 3-0 lead in the second set with ease while giving up just four points. Though Hsieh grabbed an easy win in the fourth game, and another in the sixth, it was too late. Osaka wrapped up the set almost instantly to finish the match in just more than an hour. Though Hsieh’s first run to a Grand Slam singles quarterfinals was beyond entertaining — aside from her viral interviews, the 35-year-old knocked off Bianca Andreescu and Marketa Vondrousova — she simply couldn’t put up much of a fight against Osaka on Tuesday. Osaka cruised through her first three rounds of the event with ease, and beat No. 27 Ons Jabeur of Tunisia in straight sets to reach the fourth round. Osaka then survived a fight with Spain’s Garbiñe Muguruza, who won the first set of that match 6-4 — the first set Osaka had dropped in five matches. The 23-year-old, though, quickly bounced back and rallied out of a deep hole in the final set — including surviving a pair of match points — to top Muguruza and reach the semifinals. With the win on Tuesday, Osaka will take on the winner of Serena Williams’ matchup with Romania’s Simona Halep in the semifinals on Thursday something she will definitely be paying attention to.