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World No.1 Aryna Sabalenka crushed 18-year-old American Iva Jovic's Australian Open dream run, securing a 6-3, 6-0 victory on Rod Laver Arena in under 90 minutes.
This win in Melbourne on Tuesday marked Sabalenka's fourth consecutive Australian Open semifinal and 14th Grand Slam semifinal, as per the WTA Tour website. She'll face either No. 3 seed Coco Gauff or No. 12 seed Elina Svitolina in the final four. "She's a young, great player. Super happy to get this win in straight sets, happy with the level I played today and yeah, (she's an) amazing player," Sabalenka said after her match. "The second set, I felt like I had to step in and put even more pressure on her. Because I can see that she's young, she's hungry, and I could tell during the match that no matter the score, she's still going to be there trying," Sabalenka added. Jovic, who at 18 is the youngest player to reach the last eight at the Australian Open without dropping a set since Venus Williams in 1998. Earlier, Sabalenka stormed into the women's singles quarterfinals of the ongoing Australian Open 2026 tournament on Sunday. The top-seeded player thrashed World No.17 Victoria Mboko in straight sets 6-1, 7-6(1) in a one-sided match on Rod Laver Arena. The two-time Australian Open champion won her 20th consecutive tiebreak at Grand Slam level, eclipsing an almost two-decade old record owned by Novak Djokovic, who won 19 straight tiebreaks at majors between Wimbledon 2005 and 2007. (ANI)
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