Australian Open: Magda Linette reaches maiden Slam QF after Caroline Garcia’s upset

Magda Linette continued with her impressive ways at the Australian Open on Monday. The 30-year-old reached the last-eight after ousting fourth seed Caroline Garcia 7-6(3), 6-4 in an hour and 57 minutes.

Linette had 25 winners to Garcia’s 27 and where the French player had 33 unforced errors, Linette had only 14. Linette also finished with 83 points, outhitting her higher-ranked opponent by 10 points. The 45th-ranked Pole was also able to exploit Garcia’s second serve by winning 61% points on return off it.

Australian Open: Aryna Sabalenka doesn’t miss a beat

Garcia began the match by taking control over the direction and placement of shots. She quickly gained a double break to go up 3-0 but wasn’t able to consolidate the second break. Despite this, the one-break lead she had over Linette seemed to be enough for Garcia to take a lead in the match as she served for the set in the 10th game. However, the fate of the match turned around at that point and Garcia lost the steadiness with which she’d played all that long.

Her aggressive play took a toll as she kept hitting errors even as Linette’s patience paid off and she was able to chart a comeback in the proceedings. The first set quickly slipped away from Garcia and as the second set began, Linette looked to be the better – and higher-ranked – player of the two.

Across the second set, it was Linette who held her serves with ease while Garcia struggled to retain her serves. Finally, in the ninth game, Garcia’s serve broke down for the last time in the match and in the following game, Linette closed it out on her first match point.

Next, Linette will play 30th seed Karolina Pliskova who was dominant in her match against 23rd seed Shuai Zhang winning 6-0, 6-4. This is the first time in five years the Czech’s made it to the quarter-finals of the Slam.

The last quarter-final of the 2023 Australian Open will be contested between fifth seed Aryna Sabalenka and Donna Vekic. Sabalenka outplayed 12th seed Belinda Bencic 7-5, 6-2 in their fourth-round match while Vekic needed three sets to get through Czech qualifier, 17-year-old Linda Fruhvirtova 6-2, 1-6, 6-3.