Latest sports scores at — http://sports.arabtimesonline.com Kyrgios sets Nadal clash in Australia
Pliskova, Svitolina and Bencic all fall in straight sets
MELBOURNE, Australia, Jan 25, (AP): Nick Kyrgios put aside a bloody hand, a hamstring issue, a tiff with the chair umpire and a resilient opponent who saved a pair of match points. When the Australian Open third-round thriller ended after about 4-1/2 hours Saturday, Kyrgios dropped to his back behind the baseline. Guess what’s next for the home-crowd favorite? A much-anticipated matchup with a familiar, but decidedly not friendly, foe: No. 1 Rafael Nadal.
Kyrgios eventually got past No. 16 Karen Khachanov 6-2, 7-6 (5), 6-7 (6), 6-7 (7), 7-6
Bencic all lost in straight sets, meaning nine of the top 13 seeds already are gone.
Pliskova, the 2016 US Open runner-up, lost 7-6 (4), 7-6 (3) to 30th-seeded Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. Svitolina, a semifinalist at the past two majors, was beaten 6-1, 6-2 by two-time Slam champ Garbine Muguruza. Bencic, a semifinalist at Flushing Meadows last September, offered even less pushback while being defeated 6-0, 6-1 in 49 minutes by 28th-seeded Anett Kontaveit.
Kontaveit now meets 18-yearold Iga Swiatek, who is ranked 59th and eliminated No. 19 seed Donna Vekic 7-5, 6-3.
“At this level, everything can happen,” two-time major champion Simona Halep said about all of the surprises, “so that’s why sometimes I’m a little bit stressed.”
Halep, who is seeded fourth, stuck around by beating Yulia Putintseva 6-1, 6-4, and next plays No. 16 Elise Mertens, who ended the Grand Slam return of 20-yearold American CiCi Bellis 6-1, 6-7 (5), 6-0.
Other men’s fourth-round matchups on the top half of the draw will be No. 5 Dominic Thiem against No. 10 Gael Monfils, No. 7 Alexander Zverev against No. 17 Andrey Rublev, and three-time major champion Stan Wawrinka against No. 4 Daniil Medvedev.
Nadal won the Australian Open back in 2009 and has been the runner-up four times since, including a year ago against Novak Djokovic.
It’s Nadal’s least successful major tournament: The 33-year-old Spaniard owns 12 trophies from the French Open, four from the US Open and two from Wimbledon.
He’s said he is not focused on whether he gets one more by the end of these two weeks to pull even with Federer at 20 majors – or where he ends up in the final count (Djokovic is third on the list with 16 at the moment.)
Likewise, Federer says he figures he knows both of those rivals will overtake him in the Slam standings at some point.
For now, Nadal is tracking his progress on a match-by-match basis.
And for one warm, sunny afternoon in Rod Laver Arena, at least, he was pleased.