Garcia continues revival with an upset win over Sakkari to reach last 16 in Cincinnati

Caroline Garcia beat Maria Sakkari 7-6 (2), 6-7 (6), 6-1 and will play the winner of the match between Czech Karolina Pliskova, the No 14 seed, and Belgian Elise Mertens in the next round

Caroline Garcia at the 2022 Warsaw Open Image Credit: AI/ Reuters/ Panoramic

Tennis Majors

August 17, 2022

France’s Caroline Garcia continued her recent purple patch by knocking fourth seed Maria Sakkari in the second round of the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati on Tuesday.

Garcia, a former world No 4 in singles who is now ranked 35, split the first two sets with Sakkari – both decided by tiebreaks before running away with the third set to complete the 7-6 (2), 6-7 (6), 6-1 at the Linder Tennis Family Center in Cincinnati in two hours and 18 minutes.

Garcia is now through to the last 16 where she will play either Czech Karolina Pliskova, the No 14 seed, or Belgian Elise Mertens for a spot in the quarter-finals.

Flying into the Round of 16 💨@CaroGarcia takes out the No.4 seed Sakkari, 7-6(2), 6-7(6), 6-1.#CincyTennis pic.twitter.com/OnfnOBzLID
— wta (@WTA) August 17, 2022

The Frenchwoman was one of only two women to book their spot in the third round, the other being second seed Anett Kontaveit.

Garcia has been on a roll over the past few months. She was down to No 75 in the world in early June but had rebounded into the top 40 by winning two WTA titles – Bad Homburg (grass) and Warsaw (clay). She also reached the fourth round at Wimbledon and reached the semi-finals in Lausanne and the quarter-finals in Palermo to improve her record to 27-15 for the season prior to this week.

Cincinnati WTA 1000, second-round matches (Linder Tennis Family Center, hard, USD 2.527.250, most recent results first):