Pole Iga Swiatek, the top seed, reached the last 16 of the Italian Open by beating Kazakh Yulia Putintseva 6-3, 6-4 at the Foro Italico in Roma on Saturday.
The world No 1 had to battle back from a hair’s breadth of going 5-1 down in the second set, though, winning five games in a row to ultimately seal the win in straights.
Swiatek, ranked No 1, will play the winner of the match between German Angelique Kerber and Belarusian qualifier Aliaksandra Sasnovich next.
The 22-year-old Pole won against American qualifier Bernarda Pera (6-0, 6-2) in the previous round of the Rome tournament.
Earlier in the tournament, Putintseva, ranked No 41, won against Italian wildcard Martina Trevisan (6-3, 6-4) and American Sloane Stephens, the No 31 seed (6-3, 6-2).
Roma WTA 1000, other third-round results (Foro Italico, clay, USD 5.509.771, most recent results first):
- Dayana Yastremska vs. Aryna Sabalenka
- Elina Svitolina vs. Anna Kalinskaya
- Sara Sorribes Tormo vs. Jelena Ostapenko
- Sofia Kenin vs. Rebecca Sramkova
- Elise Mertens vs. Irina-Camelia Begu
- Danielle Collins vs. Caroline Garcia
- Victoria Azarenka vs. Mayar Sherif
- Maria Sakkari vs. Anhelina Kalinina
- Coco Gauff vs. Jaqueline Cristian
- Sorana Cirstea vs. Marketa Vondrousova
- Linda Noskova vs. Qinwen Zheng
- Beatriz Haddad Maia vs. Madison Keys
- Daria Kasatkina vs. Naomi Osaka
- Angelique Kerber vs. Aliaksandra Sasnovich
- Paula Badosa vs. Diana Shnaider: saturday
