coco

Rybakina, 27, dropped only four points in a near flawless performance on serve against four-time Grand Slam champion Osaka, who said after the match she was struggling with pain in her leg.

She faced the 28-year-old full of confidence, having not dropped a set in her opening three matches at the tournament, and took control of the contest in a dominant first set.

Reigning Australian Open champion Rybakina opened up a double break over Osaka, before sealing the set in just 21 minutes.

Osaka showed greater resistance early in the second set but, after failing to convert her only break point of the match, Rybakina soon seized control again.

She broke to go 4-3 up, before safely seeing out the rest of the match, with Osaka unable to contend with her opponent’s deep groundstrokes.

Rybakina sealed the match inside 66 minutes with her seventh ace of a match where she hit a total of 29 winners to Osaka’s nine.

Asked about the gap of almost six years since her last major win, at the 2021 Australian Open, Osaka said: “I thought about it, and if I win another Grand Slam, it’s not going to change my life.

“That’s kind of crazy that I can say that, because I remember the first Slam that I won, it was, like, a huge whirlwind.”

Keys appeared on course for a first fourth-round appearance at her home slam since 2023 after taking a commanding third set lead against Olympic champion Zheng.

But the 2025 Australian Open winner would miss a match point and lose each of the final seven games in a 1-6 7-6 (7-3) 7-5 loss that stunned the crowd.

The 31-year-old Keys said she felt as though she “couldn’t play tennis anymore” in the final set.

“I obviously got off to a really good lead, and then I got really scared, like I couldn’t swing [the racquet],” Keys said.

“I felt like I couldn’t play tennis anymore. It just felt like it was a much bigger deal than just playing a tennis match all of a sudden.”

Keys, who lost the 2017 US Open final to fellow American Sloane Stephens, went out in the fourth round at the other three majors in 2026.

“I feel like I’ve been struggling for a while now. I’m going to have to make some sort of changes,” Keys said.

“I just kind of keep putting it off because that’s how the tennis world works. It’s just to the point where I actually need to do something about it.”

Anisimova, beaten by world number one Aryna Sabalenka in last year’s US Open final, lost in straight sets to Russian-born Austrian 24th seed Anastasia Potapova.

The 25-year-old was visibly frustrated with herself throughout the contest, losing her serve twice in the first set and four times in a topsy-turvy second.

Meanwhile, two-time champion Naomi Osaka fought back from a break down in the decider to see off Belgian 23rd seed Elise Mertens.

Osaka, seeded 13th, won 6-3 3-6 7-5 to set up a last-16 match against second seed Elena Rybakina.

Kazakhstan’s Rybakina, who knows she will be guaranteed to become the new world number one if she reaches the semi-finals, demonstrated her quality in a 7-6 (8-6) 6-3 victory over Ukraine’s Yuliia Starodubtseva.