By Estea Rademeyer, Sports Journalist, live from London.
Photo Credit AELTC Ryan Jenkinson.
Aryna Sabalenka faced one of the trickiest tests grass can offer at this year’s Wimbledon, and she came through it with room to spare. The world number one dispatched Jelena Ostapenko 6-4, 6-4 on Friday to book her place in the last 16, delivering a firm reminder of just how dangerous the hard-hitting Latvian can be when her shots start landing.
Sabalenka knew exactly what she was up against. The pair’s most recent meeting, in last year’s Stuttgart final, ended in defeat for the Belarusian, and with Ostapenko already holding two grasscourt titles to her name, a tally Sabalenka has yet to match, there was every reason to expect a battle on a sun-drenched Centre Court.
Instead, the match turned into a blur. Points were won and lost in a handful of shots, long rallies barely got going, and Sabalenka raced through proceedings with a tempo that might have caught the eye of Usain Bolt, watching on from the Royal Box.
The turning point came in the fifth game of the first set, when Sabalenka forced a break she would not surrender. She closed out the set in style, firing down a 111 mph ace to seal it.
Ostapenko, the 2017 French Open champion, wasn’t finished yet. Serving at 4-5 down in the second set, she fended off a match point to stay alive, but the reprieve lasted only one more game. Sabalenka wrapped up victory as Ostapenko’s return sailed long, pumping her fist as the result was confirmed.
It capped a strong week for the top seed, who had rated her own performances an 8 out of 10 in round one and a 9 out of 10 in round two. Friday’s clinical display against a genuinely threatening opponent suggested she’s closing in on the perfect score.
The straight-sets win extends Sabalenka’s head-to-head advantage over Ostapenko to 4-1 and sets up a blockbuster fourth-round meeting with fellow four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka on Sunday, a rematch of their French Open encounter last month, which Sabalenka won before an unexpected quarter-final exit to Diana Shnaider.
“Another aggressive player. Another very powerful match. I’m ready to fight and do whatever it takes to get through,” Sabalenka said of the looming clash with Osaka, against whom she holds a 3-1 career record.
The stakes are high on both sides of the net. Sabalenka is chasing a 15th straight Grand Slam quarter-final appearance, but she’ll have to get past an Osaka side that has looked sharp in reaching the Wimbledon fourth round for the first time in her career. Sabalenka herself has been stopped at the semi-final stage in each of her last three trips to the All England Club, and a maiden Wimbledon title remains the one major gap on her résumé.
Friday’s win pushed Sabalenka’s career Wimbledon record to 19-6 across 25 matches, and her overall Grand Slam win-loss tally to an imposing 113-28. She’s now a four-time major champion and eight-time finalist, though four of those finals ended in runner-up finishes.
The statistics from the Ostapenko match tell their own story of control: Sabalenka fired nine aces to Ostapenko’s four, converted 4 of 11 break points, and finished with 29 winners against just six unforced errors, a stark contrast to Ostapenko’s 18 unforced errors on the day. Both players had three double faults, though Ostapenko edged that column with just two.
There were records on the line too. According to Opta, Sabalenka has now won 36 Grand Slam matches as the top seed, drawing level with Billie Jean King for the ninth-most in the Open era. She has also reached the round of 16 at eight consecutive Grand Slam women’s singles events, a streak matched by only one other active player, Iga Swiatek.
With Osaka waiting in the fourth round, Sabalenka’s path to a first Wimbledon crown is about to get considerably harder.