Carla Suarez Navarro struck a blow for one of the endangered shots of women's tennis as she used her single-handed backhand to great effect to beat Estonian Anett Kontaveit and reach the Australian Open quarter-finals on Sunday. Suarez Navarro is the only single-hander to reach the last 16 here this year and is the only member of the world's top 40 not to strike a double-fisted backhand. So the odds are stacked against Suarez Navarro although the purists may hope she can stick around a little longer as the way she executes her topspin stroke is a thing of beauty. Suarez Navarro hit only two clean winners with it on Sunday but it was the foundation on which she built victory. She missed that one but on her third opportunity Kontaveit smacked a forehand long to send Suarez Navarro into the quarter-finals at Melbourne Park for the third time.

Source: dna January 21, 2018 07:41 UTC