Former champion Jelena Ostapenko swept second seed Karolina Pliskova out of Roland Garros on Thursday as Novak Djokovic set his sights on a 70th profession win within the French capital.

In a ladies’s event reeling from the injury-enforced withdrawal of Serena Williams, and the absence of world primary and defending champion Ashleigh Barty in addition to US Open winner Naomi Osaka, Latvia’s Ostapenko pressed her case for a second Paris title after her shock 2017 breakthrough.

The world quantity 43 fired 27 winners to only 9 for Pliskova in a 6-4, 6-2 victory which gave her a 3rd spherical match towards both Sloane Stephens, the 2017 US Open winner and runner-up in Paris in 2018, or Spain’s Paula Badosa.

Pliskova, 28, made the semi-finals in 2017 however has now didn’t get past the third spherical in her eight different appearances on the French Open.

“I attempted to be aggressive however not miss an excessive amount of as she’s such an important participant,” stated 23-year-old Ostapenko who had misplaced within the first spherical in her final two visits to the French Open.

“I needed to deliver the very best tennis that I may.”

The defeat accomplished a depressing yr on the Slams for Czech star Pliskova who solely made the third spherical on the Australian Open and second on the US Open.

Nonetheless, she arrived in Paris having retired from the Italian Open ultimate towards Simona Halep with a thigh damage.

Ostapenko was joined within the final 32 by two-time Wimbledon winner Petra Kvitova, whose finest Roland Garros run was the semi-finals in 2012.

The seventh seed defeated Italy’s 94th-ranked Jasmine Paolini 6-3, 6-Three to register her 25th French Open win.

In the meantime, Djokovic, who was likened to a snake by his vanquished first spherical opponent, tackles spear-fishing fan Ricardas Berankis for a spot within the final 32.

“It is like a snake killing its prey. I felt suffocated,” stated Sweden’s Mikael Ymer who took simply six video games off Djokovic on Tuesday.

– Snake v spear-fisher –

Victory for the world primary will give him a 70th profession win on the event the place he was champion in 2016.

Djokovic, chasing an 18th main, has a 32-1 document for the yr. His solely defeat was his disqualification from the US Open.

Now it is the flip of Lithuania’s Berankis, ranked 66, to try to reel within the Serb who’s bidding to turn out to be the primary man in half a century to win all 4 Grand Slam tournaments twice.

The 30-year-old Berankis lists spear-fishing as certainly one of his hobbies on the lakes of Lithuania.

He could have extra time for that pastime after Thursday towards Djokovic who’s enjoying within the second spherical for the 16th time.

Berankis misplaced his most up-to-date conflict with the Serb in New York on the uprooted Cincinnati occasion this yr and managed solely 5 video games towards Djokovic once they met on the 2013 US Open.

Greek fifth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas, who made the final 16 in Paris final yr however needed to come again from two units down within the first spherical towards Jaume Munar, faces wily Uruguayan veteran Pablo Cuevas.

The 34-year-old world quantity 60 has made the third spherical on 4 events and all six of his profession titles have come on clay.

Nonetheless, Tsitsipas has received all three of their conferences, two of them on clay together with on his method to the runners-up spot in Hamburg final week.

Andrey Rublev, the mop-topped Russian who defeated Tsitsipas within the Hamburg ultimate and now has three titles in 2020, additionally wanted to return again from two units down in his opener towards Sam Querrey of the US.

The 22-year-old will Thursday face Spain’s Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, the 21-year-old world quantity 70, who loved a run to the final 16 on the US Open.

Within the ladies’s event, Australian Open champion and fourth seed Sofia Kenin meets Ana Bogdan, certainly one of 5 Romanians to make the second spherical.

Garbine Muguruza, the 2016 champion in Paris and 2017 Wimbledon winner, faces Kristyna Pliskova, the world 69.

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