Second-ranked Iga Swiatek dropped only two games and advanced to the quarterfinals of the China Open by beating Magda Linette 6-1, 6-1 on Wednesday.
Swiatek will play in her 14th quarterfinal of 2023. She will next face either ninth-seeded Caroline Garcia or Anhelina Kalinina on Friday.
“I felt like I was playing a good game and I was in control from the beginning to the end,” Swiatek said. “I’m happy that I was consistent. I didn’t have ups and downs in the match, so it doesn’t matter who I’m playing. If I play like that, I feel really confident.”
Earlier, Jelena Ostapenko defeated fourth-seeded Jessica Pegula 6-4, 6-2. The 13th-seeded Latvian had 24 winners against 11 unforced errors.
“I think I always play quite well in China,” said Ostapenko, a 2017 semifinalist in Beijing. “Finally, tournaments are back here and with a lot of fans, which I like a lot. After the US Open, I had a bit more confidence and I had really good preparation before that.
“Some matches during the year were close. I was losing them, but they were very close. I felt like at some point they have to go my way. It’s working now.”
Ostapenko will next play 22nd-ranked Liudmila Samsonova. The Russian player beat Marta Kostyuk 6-4, 6-7 (4), 7-5.
Elena Rybakina avoided a huge upset as the former Wimbledon champion battled from a set and 4-2 down to claim 10 of the last 11 games against Russian 16-year-old Mirra Andreeva to prevail 2-6, 6-4, 6-1.
The Kazakh player next meets world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka or Jasmine Paolini, who will play Thursday, as will US Open champion Coco Gauff.
Shanghai Masters
Brandon Nakashima beat Bernabe Zapata Miralles 6-1, 7-6 (3) and will play third-seeded Holger Rune in the second round, while Yoshihito Nishioka defeated Daniel Altmaier 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (2) to set up a meeting with eighth-seeded Casper Ruud.
Other first-round winners included Thanasi Kokkinakis, Mackenzie McDonald, Fabian Marozsan, Jaume Munar, Yannick Hanfmann and Chinese wild card Yunchaokete Bu.
Andy Murray will play Chengdu Open finalist Roman Safiullin later Wednesday.
The top 32 seeded players, including Carlos Alcaraz and Daniil Medvedev, received a first-round bye and will play in the second round starting Saturday.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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