Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko swept her first round foe at the Eastbourne Open to forge a rematch with Alex Eala.
Months after their first meeting at the Miami Open, Ostapenko forged the rematch after a first round victory over English foe Sonay Kartal, 6-3, 7-6(2), on Tuesday (early Wednesday morning, Manila time).
Ostapenko, ranked No. 20 in the world, needed an hour and 40 minutes to best Kartal who ended up giving her a tougher fight in Set 2, forcing the Latvian into a tiebreak in her attempt to drag the match into a deciding third set.
But the Grand Slam winner zoomed to an early 4-0 start in the tiebreak that Kartal just couldn’t recover from.
She was at match point early, 6-1, before Kartal saved one match point to reach the final score.
The tiebreak win comes after Ostapenko was denied earlier in the set, with Kartal tying the set at 5-5 and 6-6 despite Ostapenko being the first to push the match to the brink.
Ostapenko thus faces Eala for the first time since the Miami Open Round of 64 in March.
Eala shocked Ostapenko en route to her semis run at the WTA 1000 tournament with a two-set win, 7-6(2), 7-5.
The 20-year-old drubbed Italy’s Lucia Bronzetti in her Round of 32 matchup in a dominant victory, 6-0, 6-1.