Ashleigh Barty beats Angelique Kerber to reach WTA Elite Trophy semi-finals in Zhuhai
Twenty-one-year-old Barty is the youngest player at the season-ending tournament in China
Twenty-one-year-old Barty, the youngest player at the season-ending tournament in China, needed just one hour and 11 minutes to down her German opponent 6-3, 6-4 at Zhuhai’s Hengqin International Tennis Centre.
It follows an impressive victory over fourth seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia on Wednesday, also in straight sets.
“I felt like I served great today,” Barty said after Thursday’s match.
“I put myself in a good position in my service games to then be super-aggressive and nice and clear when returning so I can, you know, have a little bit more of a crack and then see if I can get some of those early breaks in the sets.”
Barty got off to an impressive start against eighth seed Kerber, securing a break in the sixth game and then firing an ace to win the set.
The pair’s sole previous meeting was in Brisbane in January when Kerber, then world number one and the reigning Australian and US Open champion, survived a big scare from the Australian wild card entry.