Russian players continued their dominance at the St. Petersburg Ladies Trophy on Wednesday as Ekaterina Alexandrova, Vera Zvonareva and Svetlana Kuznetsova all booked their places in the quarterfinals.
The top-seeded Alexandrova won 6-3, 6-4 against Tereza Martincova after twice coming from a break down in the second set. She will play either fellow Russian Margarita Gasparyan or Czech Katerina Siniakova.
Zvonareva upset third-seeded Fiona Ferro to reach her first tour quarterfinal since 2019. The 36-year-old Zvonareva, a former Wimbledon finalist, needed 3 hours, 13 minutes to wrap up a 6-7 (6), 7-5, 7-6 (2) win.
Zvonareva will face an all-Russian quarterfinal against either fifth-seeded Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova or qualifier Anastasia Gasanova, who beat Katarina Zavatska 6-2, 6-7 (6), 7-5 in their first-round match.
Kuznetsova advanced with a 6-1, 7-5 win over Wang Xinyu, who double-faulted twice in a row to give her opponent match point.
Kuznetsova will face Romania’s Jaqueline Cristian, whho beat Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko 6-3, 7-6 (9) in the only last-16 match not to feature a Russian player. Cristian reached her first career tour quarterfinal after converting her fifth match point against the 2017 French Open champion in a match which finished after 1 a.m. local time.
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