Wimbledon: Sabalenka holds off Gracheva; Alexandrova, Azarenka also register wins

London, July 7 World No.2 Aryna Sabalenka fought back from a set down to beat France's Varvara Gracheva 2-6, 7-5, 6-2 and entered the third round at Wimbledon, here on Friday.

The 25-year-old Sabalenka will next face Anna Blinkova for a spot in the fourth round.

With a win, Sabalenka made it 14-1 win-loss record in majors, better than Iga Swiatek (12-1) and No.3 Elena Rybakina (10-2). After starting her career 2-4 in second-round matches at the Slams, Sabalenka is now 11-0.

After taking the opening set comfortably, Gracheva opened the second set with another love game, giving her 10 straight points. Later, the Frenchwoman suddenly found herself serving for the match at 5-4 but was broken. Sabalenka won the last three games, leveling the match.

The third set was all Sabalenka. She broke Gracheva twice and was flawless on her own serve. Sabalenka finished with eight aces.

On the other hand, Ekaterina Alexandrova edged Madison Brengle 6-7(4), 7-6(5), 7-6(7) in three tiebreaks to reach the third round of Wimbledon, the first such scoreline at Wimbledon in the Open Era.

After her historic second round result, Alexandrova will next take on Dalma Galfi in the third round.

This result is only the fourth triple-tiebreak women's singles match at Grand Slams in the Open Era. The other three all came at the US Open, where a tiebreak has been used to decide the final set since 1970.

The other three-set tie-break were Stefanie Graf's 7-6(4), 6-7(4), 7-6(4) quarterfinal defeat of Pam Shriver in 1985; Gigi Fernandez's 7-6(1), 6-7(3), 7-6(2) win over Leila Meskhi in the 1991 third round; and Rebeka Masarova's 6-7(9), 7-6(2), 7-6(9) triumph over Ana Bogdan in the 2021 first round.

In another women's singles match, former World No.1 Victoria Azarenka reached the Round of 16 for the first time since 2017 with a 6-2, 6-4 straight-sets win over Daria Kasatkina.

Azarenka needed 1 hour and 16 minutes to extend her undefeated record against Kasatkina to 4-0 and notched her 75th career win over a Top 10 player.

In the Round of 16, Azarenka will face either Elina Svitolina or 2020 Australian Open champion Sofia Kenin.