French Open 2025: Carlos Alcaraz fights into last-16 as Iga Swiatek, Aryna Sabalenka progress | Tennis News

Paris: Carlos Alcaraz survived a scare to e-book his place within the French Open final 16 on Friday, with defending ladies’s champion Iga Swiatek and Aryna Sabalenka additionally via to the fourth spherical at Roland Garros.Second seed Alcaraz received 6-1, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4 towards 69th-ranked Bosnian Damir Dzumhur within the night time session to maintain his title defence heading in the right direction.Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!Four-time Grand Slam champion Alcaraz arrived as the favorite at Roland Garros after securing the Monte Carlo Masters and Italian Open trophies within the build-up to the clay-court main.But his fluctuating performances up to now two rounds have given his rivals purpose to consider he’s susceptible.
“Today I honestly didn’t enjoy it that much. I suffered quite a lot,” mentioned a relieved Alcaraz, who got here from a break down within the fourth set to seal victory.“That’s why doing a really good result in a Grand Slam is really difficult because you have to maintain a really high level for three to four hours.”The 22-year-old subsequent meets American thirteenth seed Ben Shelton who eased previous Italian qualifier Matteo Gigante 6-3, 6-3, 6-4.Swiatek stored her bid for a fourth consecutive French Open title on observe, coming via 6-2, 7-5 towards Romania’s world quantity 60 Jaqueline Cristian in sweltering circumstances. Swiatek broke the Sixtieth-ranked Cristian twice in a cushty first set, however she was pushed lots more durable by her rival within the second and needed to save six break factors.“She really stepped up in the second set. I had to step up as well. It was an entertaining match,” mentioned Swiatek, hoping to develop into the primary lady to win 4 successive Roland Garros titles since Suzanne Lenglen 102 years in the past.The 23-year-old Pole will subsequent play twelfth seed Elena Rybakina after the Kazakh dispatched 2017 champion Jelena Ostapenko 6-2, 6-2 in a conflict of huge hitters.Swiatek has a 4-4 report towards Rybakina however has misplaced each earlier conferences on clay. However she was relieved at avoiding Ostapenko, who’s 6-0 towards her.A grinning Swiatek advised earlier she had no desire as to her last-16 opponent earlier than asking: “Am I a good liar?”“Let’s say it doesn’t matter, really. Oh, my God. I couldn’t play poker,” joked the world quantity 5 who has not received a title since final 12 months’s French Open. Sabalenka shrugs off the strainSabalenka produced a dominant show in a 6-2, 6-3 win over Thirty fourth-ranked Serbian left-hander Olga Danilovic.But the Madrid Open winner, whose greatest end result at Roland Garros was a semi-final in Paris two years in the past, insisted the strain was on Swiatek.“Let’s just leave it (the pressure) on Iga (Swiatek) since she won it, what, three times in a row,” mentioned Sabalenka.The 27-year-old Belarusian subsequent performs Sixteenth-seeded American Amanda Anisimova who ousted Danish twenty second seed Clara Tauson 7-6 (7/4), 6-4 of their third-round tie.