NEW HAVEN: Two-time defending champion Petra Kvitova needed just an hour on Thursday to beat Ekaterina Makarova 6-3, 6-1 and move into the semi-finals of the Connecticut Open, despite suffering from a cold.

Looking to join Venus Williams and Caroline Wozniacki as a four-time winner in the tournament, Kvitova overpowered the Olympic doubles champion, breaking her four times — three during the 25-minute final set. “I think that sometimes I can’t really pay too much attention how I feel,” Kvitova said.

“It’s just going out there, just being strong mentally, think about the next point, think about the tennis.”

The Olympic bronze medallist and two-time Wimbledon champion has been criticised during her career for inconsistent play. But the Czech star will be looking for her fifth consecutive appearance in the finals here and her third straight title. She also won in 2012.

“They should look at New Haven,” she said about her critics. “It’s always nice to coming somewhere when you feel, you know, at a home and you know you can play well. It always gives you little bit more confidence than normally.”

She will face top-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland in the semi-finals. Radwanska beat lucky loser Kirstin Flipkens of Belgium 6-1, 6-4.The world’s fourth-ranked player had an easy time in the first set but needed a break in the ninth game of the second set to secure the win over the 30-year-old Flipkens, who struggled with an injury to her left hand.

Flipkens, who upset Venus Williams at the Olympics, had lost in the second round of qualifying in New Haven. But she was moved into the main draw after Lesia Tsurenko withdrew with a right knee injury, then beat Belinda Bencic and Caroline Garcia.

Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina advanced with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Elena Vesnina, Makarova’s double’s partner in Rio. Svitolina outran her Russian opponent and took advantage of 33 unforced errors. “I was trying to push her to make those errors,” she said. “I think in the end she was just going for too much.”

The 21-year-old Svitolina will play Johanna Larsson, the 28-year-old Swede who upset second-seeded Roberta Vinci of Italy 7-6 (9), 6-1. Larsson lost in qualifying, but got into the main draw when Svetlana Kuznetsova withdrew because of a shoulder injury.

Larsson is the third lucky loser to advance to the semifinals in New Haven, joining Samantha Stosur (2006) and Tsurenko (2015).Vinci said she was bothered by an injury to a tendon in her left foot that has been giving her problems since the Olympics. “I was thinking always to my pain, and I lost,” Vinci said. “But now I have two or three days off before New York to try to recover.”

TOP SEED GASQUET OUSTED AT WINSTON-SALEM

LOS ANGELES: Top seed Richard Gasquet suffered a surprise 7-5, 6-3 loss to an unsung John Millman in the quarter-finals of the Winston-Salem Open on Thursday.

Millman, ranked 81st in the world, broke Gasquet five times in the match to reach his first career ATP semi-final. “Gasquet is a top player. Playing and beating him is very satisfying,” Australian Millman told reporters.

“Every week that I’m playing an ATP World Tour event, I gain more confidence that I can compete at this level, and I’m proud of that.”

Millman is an unlikely contender this week. He was knocked out in the second round of singles play at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, then had to get through qualifying to make the main draw last week in Cincinnati.

He won one main-draw match at the Western & Southern Open before falling to ninth-ranked Dominic Thiem of Austria.

Next up for Millman is a matchup with 16th seeded Pablo Carreno Busta of Spain, who knocked off Russia’s Andrey Kuznetsov 6-4, 6-3.

Second-seeded Roberto Bautista Agut rolled past Taiwan’s Yen-Hsun Lu 6-3, 6-2. The match was over in 61 minutes as Bautista Agut avoided ever facing a break point.

He takes on ninth seeded Viktor Troicki who outplayed 15th seeded Fernando Verdasco of Spain 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 in the last quarter-final match.

Published in Dawn, August 27th, 2016