The women’s draw at Indian Wells saw Garbine Muguruza and Dominika Cibulkova rally from a set down to claim victories.
Muguruza, the French Open champ, survived a scare against US teenager Kayla Day to reach the fourth round with a 3-6, 7-5, 6-2 win. The seventh seed had to dig in prevail over the hard-hitting Californian, who is last year’s US Open junior champion and had earlier upset Australian Open semi-finalist Mirjana Lucic-Baroni.
Muguruza will now face 10th seeded Elina Svitolina, who is on a 15-match winning streak. The Ukrainian advanced with a dominant 6-2, 6-1 win over Australian Daria Gavrilova.
Fifth seed Cibulkova almost fell to Kristyna Pliskova, but mounted a remarkable comeback to win 2-6, 7-6(5), 7-6(4). The Slovakian will play 19th seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova next, who downed 17th seed Barbora Strycova 6-3, 6-2.
The big name to fall at the BNP Paribas Open on Sunday was Britain’s Johanna Konta, who was seeded 11th. France’s Caroline Garcia came back from a set down to beat Konta 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7/1). Garcia will play eighth seed Svetlana Kuznetsova next, who defeated Roberta Vinci 6-2, 2-6, 6-1.
Third seed Karolina Pliskova overcame Romanian Irina Camelia Begu 6-4, 7-6 (7/2). She will play Switzerland’s Timea Bacsinszky next, who beat Kiki Bertens 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (10/8) in a closely-fought match that had multiple match points for both players.
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