Victoria Azarenka fights back to defeat Lin Zhu, sets up Australian Open quarter-final with Jessica Pegula

ByEurosport

Updated 24/01/2023 at 10:19 GMT

Victoria Azarenka will contest the quarter-finals of the Australian Open after she beat Lin Zhu 4-6 6-1 6-4 on Rod Laver Arena. The result meant the two-time champion progressed to the last eight of the Australian Open for the first time in six years after an encounter that ebbed and flowed, and finished at gone 02:00 local time. She will face Jessica Pegula, who is yet to drop a set, next.

Zhu grabs the first point against Azarenka in fourth round at Australian Open

Victoria Azarenka beat Lin Zhu 4-6 6-1 6-4 at the last-16 stage of the Australian Open on Rod Laver Arena.

Azarenka will face Jessica Pegula in the quarter-finals after having to dig deep against an unheralded opponent, whose best previous showing at a Grand Slam was the second round.

Zhu held her nerve to seal the first set but the two-time Australian Open winner hit back, bulldozing through the second to set up a decider.

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The deciding set opened with six consecutive breaks of serve, followed by two holds to love, before the Belarusian secured the decisive break in the ninth game and served it out.

“I feel so relieved,” said Azarenka after the match. “It was two hours and 40 minutes of complete pressure, point by point, momentum shifts.

“There was everything in this match.”

After a long wait due to the over four-hour battle between Stefanos Tsitsipas and Jannik Sinner that had gone on beforehand on Rod Laver Arena, the two players emerged towards midnight in what were rapidly cooling conditions.

Indeed Azarenka remained in her long-sleeved top as play began, and her opponent seemed to catch her cold as Zhu raced into an early 2-0 lead, breaking in the very first game.

The Belarusian brought it back to 2-2, and then 3-2, with some gutsy play, but Zhu held, broke and then held again to go 5-3 up as the unheralded 28-year-old stood on the verge of the opener.

Azarenka beats Zhu with incredible passing shot to reach quarter-finals

When stepping up to serve for the set, she was nerveless, hitting her spots with serves and groundstrokes alike, and as Azarenka yanked a forehand wide on set point, the Chinese let out a scream of delight towards her box.

Could Azarenka, contrastingly so experienced at this level, find a way back?

The early signs were promising in the second set, as - just as Zhu had done in the opener - Azarenka stormed into a 3-0 lead as she mixed up her tactics to deal with the power and accuracy coming off Zhu's backhand wing especially. While Zhu avoided the ignominy of a bagel, Azarenka sent the match to a decider when she served out the set to take it 6-1.

Azarenka broke in the first game of the third set, meaning she had won seven of the last eight games since dropping the first set.

However, she could not sustain that momentum as an astonishing passage saw six straight breaks of serve. Zhu eventually ended the spell by holding - to love - in the seventh game of the set, with Azarenka mimicking to draw level.

The Belarusian – chasing a first Australian Open last-eight appearance in six years – found another break, her fourth and the set’s seventh, in the next game before serving it out to secure passage to a showdown with Pegula.