{"id":69019,"date":"2024-03-08T23:22:06","date_gmt":"2024-03-08T23:22:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/osaka-off-the-mark-at-indian-wells-the-express-tribune\/"},"modified":"2024-03-08T23:22:06","modified_gmt":"2024-03-08T23:22:06","slug":"osaka-off-the-mark-at-indian-wells-the-express-tribune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/osaka-off-the-mark-at-indian-wells-the-express-tribune\/","title":{"rendered":"Osaka off the mark at Indian Wells | The Express Tribune"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\nINDIAN WELLS:
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Naomi Osaka powered through on a third match point to advance to the second round of the ATP-WTA Indian Wells<\/a> Masters on Thursday with a 6-3, 6-1 win over Italian qualifier Sara Errani.<\/p>\n

The four-time Grand Slam champion from Japan, fighting to lift a post-motherhood ranking of 287, sealed victory with a forehand winner.<\/p>\n

Osaka<\/a> then joked about heading back to her hotel to change nappies on her infant daughter, born last summer.<\/p>\n

Thursday’s victory featured five breaks of serve in the first set before the 2018 Indian Wells champion stepped it up for a straight-sets victory in 70 minutes.<\/p>\n

“It’s a pleasure to be back playing – but once I get home, I’m a mom,” she said. “When I was pregnant I really wanted to return to playing.<\/p>\n

“I know I’ll have to play well to improve… but I’m excited to start winning more matches.”<\/p>\n

After losing in the Australian Open first round, the California-based player reached the Doha quarter-finals last month.<\/p>\n

She next faces Liudmila Samsonova for a third-round spot.<\/p>\n

Former WTA number one Caroline Wozniacki took a further step in her return to tennis, with the Dane finishing off a match interrupted the night before by rain.<\/p>\n

It took only a few extra minutes on court for the number 204 to conclude victory against Zhu Lin of China 7-6 (8\/6), 6-1 with Wozniacki now facing Croat Donna Vekic.<\/p>\n

Venus Williams remained winless since August as the veteran lost a promising early lead and crashed out 2-6, 6-3, 6-0 to Nao Hibino of Japan.<\/p>\n

The 43-year-old Williams last competed at the US Open in August and earned her last victory two weeks before in Cincinnati.<\/p>\n

Britain’s 250th-ranked Emma Raducanu scored a first-round win over number 96 qualifier Rebeka Masarova of Spain 6-2, 6-3, with the 2021 US Open champion next playing Ukrainian Dayana Yastremska.<\/p>\n

“I was really pleased with how I stayed focused, didn’t get down and competed really hard in tough situations,” said Raducanu, who overcame eight double-faults.<\/p>\n

In the men’s draw, Australian Aleksandar Vukic lined up as the opening opponent for top seed Novak Djokovic after defeating Japan’s Shintaro Mochizuki 7-6 (7\/4), 7-6 (8\/6).<\/p>\n

Rising Czech Tomas Machac added to a miserable 2024 start for former number three Stan Wawrinka with the youngster defeating the 38-year-old Swiss 7-6 (7\/3), 4-6, 6-2.<\/p>\n

Defeat in just over two hours marked only the second first-round loss here for the veteran in 13 appearances.<\/p>\n

Machac advances to a second-round meeting against France’s Adrian Mannarino, the 21st seed.<\/p>\n

French showman Gael Monfils lost just three games as he thrashed Australian Max Purcell 6-1, 6-2.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

INDIAN WELLS: Naomi Osaka powered through on a third match point to advance to the second round of the ATP-WTA Indian Wells Masters on Thursday with a 6-3, 6-1 win over Italian qualifier Sara Errani. The four-time Grand Slam champion from Japan, fighting to lift a post-motherhood ranking of 287, sealed victory with a forehand […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":69020,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.tribune.com.pk\/media\/images\/osaka1709902100-0\/osaka1709902100-0.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69019\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}