Elena Rybakina advanced to the semifinals of the tennis tournament in Miami after beating Maria Sakari 7-5, 6-7 (4), 6-4 after nearly two hours and 50 minutes of hard-fought battle.
Rybakina, who played in the final in Florida last year, was the first to break in the sixth game, but Sakari fought back with a break back. However, the Kazakhstan reached success in the opening set after another break. The second was decided in a tiebreak, after the two tennis players exchanged two breaks each, and Rybakina missed two match points at 5-4 in her favour. Greece's first racket showed stronger nerves in the long game to reach the third set. In it, a break in the seventh game proved decisive for the final outcome.
Thus, Rybakina will again play in the last four of the competition and her rival there will be the three-time champion Victoria Azarenka. The representative of Belarus overcame Rybakina's compatriot Yulia Putintseva, after 7-6 (4), 1-6, 6-3 in a match that lasted exactly three hours.
Azarenka battled back to success in the first set after twice falling behind with a break. In the end, she triumphed 7-4 in the tiebreak. In the second set, Putintseva gave only a game to her opponent, but in the decisive third set, Azarenka pulled away with 5-1, and although the Kazakh returned one of the breaks, she had no strength for more and thus left the competition.
Azarenka and Rybakina have three matches between them, with the Kazakh taking all three matches. Their last was at the tournament in Dubai a little over a month ago, when the Belarusian gave up when the result was set apiece.
The other semi-final in the top half of the schedule will be determined by the matches between Ekaterina Alexandrova and Jessica Pegula and Caroline Garcia and Danielle Collins. /BGNES
