Wimbledon champion Iga Swiatek was the latest top player to suffer an upset in Montreal falling to Denmark’s Clara Tauson as Naomi Osaka showed flashes of her past dominance.
Tauson gained revenge for her Wimbledon defeat at the hands of Swiatek to reach the last eight with a 7-6 (7-1) 6-3 victory.
Swiatek’s loss came a day after top seed Coco Gauff was stunned in straight sets by Canadian teenager Victoria Mboko.
“It’s tough conditions here with the wind but I tried my best to keep my head cool and keep working,” Tauson said in her on-court interview.
“Even though I got broken in the second set, I was feeling confident and I’m really happy about the win.”
Poland’s Swiatek won a solitary point in the first-set tiebreak – that came from a Tauson double fault – and was then broken early in the second set.
Swiatek broke back to make it 4-3 but failed to hold in her next service game as Tauson progressed to set up a quarter-final against Madison Keys.
The big-serving American saved two match points to emerge with a hard-fought 4-6 6-3 7-5 win over Czech Karolina Muchova.
Tauson won their only previous meeting in Auckland in January although Keys went on to capture her first Grand Slam title at the Australian Open later that month.
Former world No 1 Osaka showed flashes of her past dominance to reach the quarter-finals, needing just 49 minutes to steamroll Anastasija Sevastova 6-1 6-0.
It marks the first time the Japanese star has advanced to the last eight of a WTA 1000 event in 19 months, which came in Doha in 2024.
“I had a solid plan coming in here, and it happened to work out very well,” said Osaka, who is working with Swiatek’s former coach Tomasz Wiktorowski having parted ways with world-renowned Patrick Mouratoglou.
Osaka will face Elina Svitolina for a place in the semi-finals after the Ukrainian beat Wimbledon finalist Amanda Anisimova 6-4 6-1.
Shelton and Fritz advance in Toronto
In Toronto, fourth-seeded Ben Shelton rallied in the third set to beat 13th-seeded Flavio Cobolli 6-4 4-6 7-6 (7-1).
“Really difficult match. I was down and out, being a break down in the third, the way that he was playing,” Shelton said.
“I gave myself a second chance and I did a good job with it, kind of running from there. A really difficult opponent for me, someone who’s gotten me in three sets after I’ve won the first set twice.”
He will face ninth-seeded Alex de Minaur, a 6-2 4-6 6-4 winner over Frances Tiafoe.
Andrey Rublev advanced to the quarter-finals for the first time after Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich Fokina was forced to retire from the match with an injury while trailing 7-6 (7-3) 6-7 (2-7) 3-0.
Second-seeded Taylor Fritz came through a late-night thriller against 19th-seeded Czech Jiri Lehecka 7-6 (7-4) 6-7 (5-7) 7-6 (7-5) and has now reached the final eight at every Masters 1000 event.
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