Ons Jabeur has set about erasing the disappointment of her last trip Down Under, dismantling Sorana Cirstea for her first win of the new year at the Adelaide International.
A back injury drew a line through her Sydney and Australian Open campaigns last summer, so the Tunisian top seed was relieved to begin with a 7-6(3), 6-1 win for a quarterfinal berth on a blustery night under lights.
“I mean she’s a great player. I had two breaks up but she pushed me to do more and more,” Jabeur said. “As soon as it clicked for me in the second set it was much better. Next time I’ll try to win this match easier.
“That’s the point for me, that I’m trying to learn to not waste a lot of games like this, but pretty happy with the performance.
“2023 first win, I’m going for more and hopefully it’s going to be great here.”
Scuppered Australian summer aside, 2022 was without doubt the 28-year-old’s breakout season, a year in which she scaled to her current mark of world No.2 on the heels of Grand Slam final appearances at Wimbledon and the US Open.
It allowed some leeway to reiterate some goals and re-evaluate others for the season ahead.
“Definitely no more losing finals in Grand Slams, that’s one thing, but I’m just going to play freely and just play my game,” Jabeur said. “I want the No.1 spot, I want to win Grand Slam titles.
“I just want to make Tunisia happy, I want to make Africa happy I want to make people from my region happy. I just want to create more history, for sure.”
The 32-year-old Cirstea had picked up her first win since last year’s US Open against Viktorija Golubic in the opening round but this was a vastly improved version of Jabeur than the one she last beat in 2014.
Having taking control of the tiebreak Jabeur treated the crowd to her exceptional finesse, scooping a quick-fire half-volley before flicking the backhand pass.
It rattled the Romanian and she looked at her coach, former Australian Open champion Thomas Johansson, in disbelief as she was broken for 2-0.
It proved her last hurrah as Jabeur conceded just one more game to move into a quarterfinal clash with Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk.
Azarenka sets quarterfinal clash with teen
With five of her 21 career titles – including both major trophies – coming on Australian soil it should come as little wonder Victoria Azarenka is comfortably finding her feet at this year’s Adelaide International.
The 33-year-old former world No.1 served a reminder to highly touted 20-year-old Zheng Qinwen she was still a force to be reckoned with in a 6-2, 7-5 victory on Thursday.
It was a marked step up from the struggles she encountered in her opening match against Anhelina Kalinina.
“I didn’t really know my opponent. I watched her play a little bit but when you face somebody you don’t know it takes a second to kind of figure out.,” Azarenka said. “She’s a great talent. I feel like she’s going to be a really, really good player, but I thought that I stuck to my game plan pretty well today.”
Azarenka broke in a 5.5-minute game for 4-2 and it was enough to set the wheels of momentum in motion as she completed the opening set in 39 minutes.
The second set was a more closely fought affair before Azarenka piled on the pressure to break on her first match point when Zheng fired a backhand wide.
“I was consistent, I was taking my chances when I could. I kept creating more chances,” Azarenka said.
“I was a lot more aggressive, a bit more comfortable today on court.”
It sent her through to a second straight Adelaide quarterfinal and a shot at another rising prospect, 18-year-old Linda Noskova.
Earlier, the 18-year-old backed up her first top-10 win over Daria Kasatkina from the opening round with a 6-2, 6-2 victory over fellow qualifier Claire Liu.
The Czech struck 20 winners in the 73-minute outing.
Seventh seed Jelena Ostapenko was unable to reproduce the lights-out form she found against Karolina Pliskova in the first round.
The Latvian made a swift 6-3, 6-0 exit to Romanian Irina-Camelia Begu on Thursday.
Begu overturned a 3-1 first-set deficit to dash into a quarterfinal meeting with fourth seed Veronika Kudermetova.