Aryna Sabalenka beat Qinwen Zheng to reach the semi-finals of the Miami Open for the first time in her career.
Sabalenka is the world number one and is yet to drop a set on her run to the semi-finals of the Miami Open.
Despite enjoying another straight sets victory in the quarter-finals, Sabalenka struggled with something against Zheng.
After Sabalenka dipped in form during the Middle Eastern swing, she appears now to have returned back to the level that has helped win her three Grand Slam titles.
Aryna Sabalenka matches Serena Williams record at the Miami Open
As a result of her best career run at the Miami Open, Sabalenka has put herself alongside four WTA greats.
Sabalenka reached the Australian Open final in January, but was unable to win her third successive title at the Melbourne major after being beaten by Madison Keys.
More recently, the Belarusian returned to form for the start of the sunshine double, before Sabalenka lost to Mirra Andreeva at Indian Wells in the final.
Despite these disappointing final defeats, Sabalenka’s consistency has enabled her to produce a historic feat already this year.
Only three other WTA number ones have reached at least the semi-finals of the Australian Open, Indian Wells and the Miami Open all in the same year.
The only other women to achieve this are Steffi Graf, Serena Williams and Martina Hingis, with the latter doing it on three occasions.
Graf was the only one of those players to have gone onto win the Australian Open, Indian Wells and the Miami Open all in the same year as being world number one.
Did Aryna Sabalenka ever play Serena Williams?
Sabalenka and Williams are sometimes compared, with the pair actually playing against each other before the latter retired at the 2022 US Open.
This came at the 2021 Australian Open, and although Sabalenka was the higher ranked player, it was 23-time Grand Slam champion Williams who came out on top to reach the quarter-finals.
Williams beat Sabalenka, 6-4 2-6 6-4, in a tightly contested match and after spoke about how she was ready for the power of her opponent.
“I didn’t want to be out of the tournament, so it felt good to kind of clutch that in the end and get through that,” Williams told media at the time.
“I just felt like even games that I lost, I was so close to winning. Not all games, but probably most of those games. I just needed to play better on the big points. I knew that I could. I still hadn’t reached my peak. I was like: ‘Okay, Serena, you got this, just keep going’.
“It was definitely a lot of power … but I’m used to it in practice. I know how to get them. I was okay with it really. If she wants to play power, let’s go.”
Williams played her last Miami match in 2019, finishing her career with a record eight titles at the WTA 1000 tournament.
Sabalenka is yet to win her first at this event, but will look to move closer to achieving that goal when she plays Jasmine Paolini for a place in the Miami Open final.
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