Haddad Maia, Potapova enter Cleveland semi-finals; Jabeur pulls out of US Open

No. 1 seed Beatriz Haddad Maia of Brazil needed just 75 minutes to score a 6-2, 6-2 victory over Frenchwoman Clara Burel in the quarter-finals of Cleveland Open on Thursday.

Haddad Maia won not only 21 of 27 first-service points (77.8 percent) but also 12 of her 22 first-return points (54.5 percent). She had two aces and broke Burel’s serve five times in 13 chances.

Haddad Maia’s semi-final opponent will be Czech third seed Katerina Siniakova, who rallied past American No. 6 seed Peyton Stearns 1-6, 6-3, 6-4.

No. 5 seed Anastasia Potapova of Russia cruised to a 6-2, 6-1 win over Romania’s Ana Bogdan. She advanced to face American McCartney Kessler, who followed her upset of No. 4 Xinyu Wang of China on Wednesday by eliminating Arantxa Rus of the Netherlands 6-4, 6-2.

Elsewhere, second-seeded Emma Navarro of the United States beat ninth-seeded Magdalena Frech of Poland 6-7 (3), 6-0, 6-2 on Thursday night to reach the Monterrey Open semi-finals.

The 23-year-old Navarro will face sixth-seeded Linda Noskova of the Czech Republic on Friday in the WTA 500 hard-court event at Sonoma Club. Noskova topped fifth-seeded Elina Svitolina of Ukraine 6-4, 6-4 in the late match.

Navarro was the 2021 NCAA champion as a freshman at the University of Virginia and added her first WTA Tour title in January at Hobart. She lost to Diana Shnaider in May in Paris in the Trophee Clarins final.

Third-seeded Ekaterina Alexandrova of Russia will face Lulu Sun of New Zealand in the other semifinal. Alexandrova beat seventh-seeded Yue Yuan of China 7-5, 7-6 (3), and Sun topped Erika Andreeva of Russia 6-4, 6-3.

The 29-year-old Alexandrova won the last of her four career WTA Tour titles last year at Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands. The 19-year-old Noskova and 23-year-old Sun are winless on the tour.

Meanwhile, Tunisia’s Ons Jabeur, who has been struggling with a shoulder injury, withdrew from the US Open on Thursday, officials said.

World number 17 Jabeur was runner-up to Iga Swiatek in the 2022 final in New York.

“I am truly sad to announce that my shoulder won’t recover in time for the US Open. I feel I need to give 100 % and today its not possible yet. Life has ups and downs, but sometimes in the very negative moments we all need to find the positive in it,” she wrote in her Instagram post.

“This year has been very tough for me, but I know somewhere the light is there. I keep smiling like I always do because I am grateful for my life, my family, my sponsors and the fans that have always supported me.”

“I promise once I get my strength back I will come back stronger,” Jabeur concluded.

Jabeur, a former world number two, skipped the Olympics in an effort to preserve her fitness but then withdrew from the Washington WTA tournament at the start of the US Open hardcourt swing.

She then lost in the first round at Toronto to Naomi Osaka before pulling out of the Cincinnati Open last week.

Her slot in the US Open draw passes to Elise Mertens of Belgium. Mertens’ spot in turn will go to a qualifier.

World number three Coco Gauff is hoping a trip home for a mental reset will help her bounce back from a string of disappointing results as she prepares to defend her U.S. Open crown.

From a fourth-round exit at Wimbledon, where she shouted at her coach as her game crumbled, to an early-round exit in the Paris Olympics singles tournament, where she argued with officials, Gauff seemed to have lost the dominant swagger that had some comparing her not long ago to a young Serena Williams.

The highs of carrying the US flag at the Paris opening ceremony and trading Olympic pins with her sporting idols quickly evaporated on the clay at Roland Garros.

“I feel like I have to work on consistency, overall,” Gauff said, adding that she would go home to reset before hitting the hard-court at Flushing Meadows.

Agencies