ST PETERSBURG: Margarita Gasparyan and Daria Kasatkina both won in the round of 16 on Thursday as a record seven Russian players made the quarterfinals of the St. Petersburg Ladies Trophy.

The eighth-seeded Kasatkina beat Aliaksandra Sasnovich of Belarus 5-7, 6-3, 7-6 (7-2) and Gasparyan ousted Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic 6-4, 6-4 to give Russia a clean sweep of all four matches played Thursday.

Three other Russians advanced on Wednesday, giving the country seven players in the quarter-finals of a tournament for the first time. The WTA Tour said the last time seven players from one country reached the last eight of a tour-level event was in 1993, when seven Americans were in the Oakland quarter-finals.

The other two matches on Thursday were all-Russian affairs.

Anastasia Gasanova rallied to beat fifth-seeded Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 1-6, 7-6 (10-8), 7-6 (7-4) despite being ranked 196 places lower at 241st. Second-seeded Veronika Kudermetova needed nearly three hours to overcome Kamilla Rakhimova 7-5, 3-6, 7-6 (7-5).

Top-seeded Ekaterina Alexandrova, Vera Zvonareva and Svetlana Kuznetsova advanced on Wednesday. The sole non-Russian player in the last eight is Romania’s Jaqueline Cristian.

Published in Dawn, March 20th, 2021