Guadalajara [Mexico], September 21 : The No.2 seed Maria Sakkari of Greece eased into the quarterfinals of the Guadalajara Open after dispatching Italy's Camila Giorgi in their Round of 16 clash.
Sakkari needed just over an hour to register a comprehensive 6-2, 6-2 victory over Italian.
Sakkari will next face Colombia's Emiliana Arango in the quarterfinals.
"It’s always very tricky to play Camila because she’s a very aggressive player. I’m very happy to be back in the quarterfinals here," WTA quoted Sakkari as saying.
Sakkari won in just 66 minutes, increasing her lead over Giorgi, who is ranked 56th, to 4-0. Against Giorgi, Sakkari has never suffered a set loss of more than three games.
The Greek player had eight winners to Giorgi's five in the match. The Greek also had 11 unforced errors, but that number was much smaller than Giorgi's 29.
"I know my unforced errors were very low, which is something that I was hoping before going into the match. I’m just very satisfied with the way I played because that was exactly what I had in mind," Sakkari said.
With three service breaks per set, Sakkari converted six of her eight break points. Sakkari jumped out to an early 5-0 lead in the match, and even though the No. 2 seed went behind early in the second set due to a break, she recovered and won the next six games in a row.
In order to advance to the semifinals, Sakkari will now face World No.180 Arango for the first time. Arango, a promising 22-year-old, defeated American Taylor Townsend 7-5, 1-6, 6-4 to go to her maiden WTA 1000 quarterfinal. At 4-2 in the third set, Arango trailed by a break before winning the next four games in a row to eliminate Townsend.
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