Healthy Halep wins in three

MASON, Ohio — Simona Halep wasn’t sure how her left foot would feel. After dropping her first set but feeling no pain, she dug in and advanced at the Western & Southern Open.

The fourth-seeded Halep had no problems with her left Achilles’ tendon as she rallied to beat Ekaterina Alexandrova 3-6, 7-5, 6-4 on Wednesday, one week after she dropped out of the Rogers Cup quarterfinals in Toronto because of the injury. She was tentative when she took the court.

“You are a bit scared,” Halep said. “But I think I played much better in the end.”

The reigning Wimbledon champion fought off two break points in the third set and then broke Alexandrova to serve for the match. It wasn’t easy, but at least it was pain-free.

“I felt slowly that I’m feeling good and I have no pain,” Halep said. “I got the confidence game by game, even if she was leading me.”

Top-seeded Ashleigh Barty beat Maria Sharapova 6-4, 6-1. Sharapova has had a rough time since retiring in the first round at Wimbledon with a forearm injury, losing in the opening round in Toronto after leading by a set.

Sharapova reported no physical problems, but she felt rusty because of the lack of matches due to the injury — something she can fix with practice.

“I have sat in this chair a few times where I haven’t finished the match or I feel like I have a long road ahead of me in terms of recovery with the body, so, yeah, that’s a positive,” she said. “But there’s definitely the repetition, just the feeling of being in a match. It’s very different.”

Barty, too, was looking to recover from an upset, losing her first match at Toronto last week, and she was satisfied with her return to the court.

Also, No. 2 seed Naomi Osaka beat Aliaksandra Sasnovich 7-6 (3), 2-6, 6-2 in a much closer rematch of their U.S. Open match last year.