New Delhi: Second seeds Jannik Sinner and Iga Swiatek didn’t need to put in a lot of effort to enter the Australian Open quarter-finals in Melbourne on Monday.
Sinner breezed past fellow Italian Luciano Darderi 6-1, 6-3, 7-6(2) while Swiatek was comfortable throughout her 6-0, 6-3 defeat of qualifier Maddison Inglis.
World No. 2 Sinner took two hours and nine minuted to advance to his fourth Australian Open quarter-final, reaching the mark of Grigor Dimitrov, Kei Nishikori and Stefanos Tsitsipas for the fourth-most appearances at that stage among active players.
“It was very difficult. We are good friends off the court, that’s also a small difficulty to put away,” Sinner said of Darderi.
“In the third set I had a couple of break chances, (but) I couldn’t use them… Then I got very tight, so I’m very happy that I closed it in three sets.”
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Sinner blended power with efficiency and finished with 46 winners, including 19 aces to extend their record against fellow Italians 18-0 and Sinner will face either Ben Shelton or Casper Ruud in the last eight stage.
“We put a lot of work in, especially with the serve. We changed the motion a bit and I feel for sure a little bit more confident,” Sinner added.
“There is still room to improve, which is normal, but I’m very happy with how I have come back in the new season. At the end of last season, I served really well, (and) it’s much more stable.”
Swiatek was similarly impressive on way to her 14th career Grand Slam quarter-final, and third in Melbourne Park, where she will meet fifth seed Elena Rybakina.
Swiatek leads 6-5 in head-to-head count against Rybakina (including 4-2 on outdoor hard courts), but lost their only previous Australian Open meeting 6-4, 6-4 in the 2023 fourth round.