Aryna Sabalenka has continued her struggles on the court after falling in the Dubai Tennis Championships round of 16.
Sabalenka shone on the WTA Tour in 2024, with the Australian Open and the US Open titles among her honours.
World number one Sabalenka then continued that form into 2025, emerging victorious at the Brisbane International.
Since then, however, she has lost the Australian Open final and struggled at the Qatar Open and Dubai Tennis Championships.
Sabalenka fell in the round of 32 in Doha, with the top seed losing to Ekaterina Alexandrova in her first match since Melbourne.
Aryna Sabalenka loses five successive serving games in shock Dubai loss
The Belarusian then recovered to beat Veronika Kudermetova at the same stage in Dubai, but lost to Clara Tauson shortly after.
Sabalenka lost five consecutive serving games against Tauson, the first time that has happened to her since August 2022 against Daria Kasatkina in San Jose, as per OptaAce.
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The Dane reached her first career WTA 1000 quarter-final with the success, having beaten the world number one 6-3, 6-2 after one hour and 23 minutes.
Aryna Sabalenka v Clara Tauson Dubai Tennis Championships serving stats
Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek have created a superb rivalry, but neither have really got their seasons going just yet.
The former is, however, certain to bounce back sooner rather than later, having perhaps taken on too much too soon after Melbourne.
She beat Tauson at the Australian Open en route to reaching the final, but the 22-year-old managed to expertly enact revenge in Dubai.
Sabalenka remains in top spot in the world rankings thanks to her superb success in recent times, but Swiatek will undoubtedly be eyeing a return to the summit.
| Aryna Sabalenka | Stat | Clara Tauson |
| 4 | Aces | 7 |
| 3 | Double faults | 1 |
| 58% (40/69) | 1st serve | 50% (24/48) |
| 47.5% (19/40) | 1st serve points won | 79.2% (19/24) |
| 41.4% (12/29) | 2nd serve points won | 41.7% (10/24) |
| 62.5% (10/16) | Break points saved | 33.3% (1/3) |
| 9 | Service games played | 8 |
The Belarusian certainly wasn’t at her best in her latest meeting with Tauson, but the latter deserves all the plaudits for her display.
She played without fear to shock the top seed, with Tauson hitting seven aces en route to levelling her head-to-head record with Sabalenka to 1-1.
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