NOTTINGHAM, England (Reuters) -Two-times defending champion Katie Boulter was given a real scare before battling past fellow Briton Sonay Kartal 6-4 1-6 7-5 to reach the Nottingham Open quarter-finals on Thursday.
Boulter was pushed all the way by Kartal, who held a 4-2 lead in the decider, but the champion roared back to extend her winning run in the competition to 12 matches despite struggling in the heat.
“I have so much respect for Sonay, she is such a tough competitor and I also know she’s never going to give me anything at any point,” Boulter said.
“I know she’s going to surpass me at some point, she’s got the game for it, she’s got the head for it. I’m going to have to face that fact.
“But at the very end I just wanted to grit my teeth as hard as I possibly could and get myself over the line. I have such great vibes here but the heat was killing me today.
“I am definitely proper British because I can’t handle the heat at all.”
Boulter will face McCartney Kessler next after the American defeated China’s Zhu Lin 6-1 6-4, and is the only British player left in the competition after Mingge Xu lost 7-5 6-1 to Polish sixth seed Magda Linette.
Linette now meets Danish second seed Clara Tauson, who advanced after a 6-4 6-4 win over Russian Anna Blinkova.
(Reporting by Trevor Stynes, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
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