OSAKA DOWNS GIORGI TO ENTER TOKYO FINAL, TO FACE PLISKOVA
TOKYO:US Open champion Naomi Osaka stormed past Italy’s Camila Giorgi 6-2, 6-3 on Saturday to reach the Pan Pacific Open final where she will face Karolina Pliskova.
Osaka’s victory in front of her home crowd was her 10th in a row and did not look in doubt from the moment the world No 7 pounded down a huge ace with her first serve of the match. The 20-year-old, who became Japan’s first Grand Slam singles champion in New York two weeks ago, hit a further eight aces to overwhelm world No 37 Giorgi.
Osaka advanced to face No 8 Pliskova in the final after the bigserving Czech outlasted Croatia’s Donna Vekic 6-2, 4-6, 6-3.
DJOKER-FEDERER LOSE
CHICAGO: Team Europe took a commanding 3-1 lead over Team World in the Laver Cup on Friday despite seeing their highprofile doubles pairing of Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic suffer the defending champions’ only defeat of the first day here. Jack Sock and Kevin Anderson combined to deliver the sole triumph for their side, overcoming the world’s second and third ranked singles players 6-7(5), 6-3, 10-6 to prevent an opening day shutout for Team Europe.
WAWRINKA GOES DOWN
STPETERSBURG: Slovakia’s Martin Klizan battled back from a set down to beat Stan Wawrinka on Saturday and reach the Saint Petersburg Open final.
Klizan, the 2012 champion here, won 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 in two hours and 16 minutes to chalk up his first win over the 33-year-old Wawrinka in their fourth headto-head meeting.