Yastremska and Noskova go to quarterfinals of Grand Slam tournament

Monday at the Australian Open, Dayana Yastremska and Linda Noskova advanced to their maiden Grand Slam singles quarterfinals in different ways.

Yastremska defeated two-time winner Victoria Azarenka 7-6 (6), 6-4, while 18th-ranked Elina Svitolina quit due to a back injury after trailing Noskova 3-0.

Azarenka served twice in the first set and had two set opportunities at 6-5, but she couldn’t convert them, and Yastremska took the first set on her second opportunity after 74 minutes. The Ukrainian led 3-0 in the second set, but Yastremska won six of the next seven games to seal the match, finishing with 37 wins.

“I think I need to take a thousand breaths because my heart I think is going to jump out of my body,” she added.

“During the match, I was thinking about how I had previously lost like 25 times. I was losing the tiebreak and the second set, and I constantly felt like I was falling behind. But because I’m a warrior, I believe I won this match, and the crowd support was incredible.”

There was no handshake, as is customary among Ukrainian, Russian, and Belarusian players, but Yastremska raised her racket toward Azarenka.

The first game of the Noskova-Svitolina match lasted 11 minutes and resulted in twenty points. Noskova broke serve and held for 2-0 before Svitolina took a timeout to take treatment for her lower back.

When she returned, the Ukrainian’s serve speed was significantly lower, and her mobility was hampered. After getting broken a second time and fighting back tears, Svitolina shook Noskova’s hand before retiring.

Svitolina said the injury occurred at the conclusion of the opening game.

“I got a spasm, like a shooting pain,” she told me. “I couldn’t do anything; my back was fully frozen, and I was terribly depressed. I’ve had some back ailments in the past that were just exhaustion the next day of the match, but this one was completely unexpected. “I felt like someone had shot me in the back.”

Noskova defeated top-ranked Iga Swiatek in the third round.

“Obviously today was not the way I had planned to win,” she went on to say. “I feel (sorry) for Elina, I hope she gets very well soon.”