Konta upsets top-seeded Halep to advance at Wuhan Open

But I played a really good match.

Halep will now face Johanna Konta, another beneficiary of a retirement as Victoria Azarenka pulled out of their tie having lost the first set and game one of the second.

There were no such problems for top seed Simona Halep, who breezed past Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 6-2 6-1 in the day’s final encounter. Two errors later and the set was hers.

Williams shows few signs of slowing down and she said she now had her sights set on next year’s Rio Olympics, where she will hope to add to her haul of four gold medals. Kvitova will next face 15th-seeded Roberta Vinci in the third round.

Muguruza is in the running to make it to the top-eight Women s Tennis Association Finals in Singapore at the end of this month, with the field looking increasingly open after the Wuhan upsets.

Williams continued her fine form by swatting aside World No. 10 Suarez Navarro 6-3, 6-4, reports Xinhua. “I found my game again”, said the hard-hitting Spaniard. “I was just trying to stay out there as long as possible and keep fighting every single point”, Konta said. How many places will depend on whether she can advance beyond her quarter-final, where she will take on No8 seed Karolina Pliskova, who took nearly two hours to beat Elena Svitolina. Williams, who is the oldest player at Wuhan and turned professional in 1994, when Goerges was not yet six, becomes only the ninth player to reach 700 wins.

Ana Ivanovic advanced to the third round of the Wuhan Open with a 6-0, 6-3 win over Madison Brengle on Tuesday.

“I’m very, very happy and very, very exhausted right now”, said Slovak Schmiedlova.

Simone Bolelli of Italy qualified for his seventh quarterfinal match of the season after eighth-seeded Victor Estrella Burgos retired with a back injury while trailing 6-4, 4-0.