Harriet Dart has broken new ground by reaching her first WTA Tour semi-final, at the Transylvania Open.
The British No 3, who has now won five matches in a row in the Romanian city of Cluj-Napoca after coming through qualifying, comfortably defeated Spain’s Nuria Párrizas Díaz 6-3, 6-2.
Dart had lost her previous four Tour quarter-finals, all at British grass-court events. The 27-year-old is now guaranteed to return to the top 100 next week, and will overtake Jodie Burrage as the British No 2 if she can go further. Dart lost her opening service game but from there took a firm grip on the match, finding the right balance of aggression and consistency to open up a 4-1 lead. After clinching the opening set, she then moved 3-0 ahead in the second, with Párrizas Díaz’s higher error count proving her undoing.
Dart said: “I’m really excited to keep it going. I don’t think either of us played particularly good tennis, I think both of us were a bit nervous.
“I was just happy that I fought really hard, kept my head together and managed to take the close games and the big moments.”
Meanwhile, Emma Raducanu has been given a wild card into the Qatar Open and will face Anhelina Kalinina in the opening round. The former US Open champion revealed after losing to Ons Jabeur in the second round of the WTA Tour event in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday that she was hoping to play in Doha.
Her wish has been granted and the 21-year-old, who has won three of her six matches following her return from eight months on the sidelines, will open her campaign against 32nd-ranked Ukrainian Kalinina early next week.
They have played once before, on the clay courts of Madrid in 2022, with Kalinina winning a close contest in three sets. The winner of the match will take on big-hitting eighth seed Jelena Ostapenko, who has already won two titles this season.
The Qatar tournament, the first WTA 1000 event of the season - the highest level of the tour - sees both Iga Swiatek and Coco Gauff playing for the first time since the Australian Open, but Melbourne champion Aryna Sabalenka is not in the field.