Spain’s Arruabarrena advances at Miami Open

Miami, March 27 (IANS) Spain's Lara Arruabarrena defeated American tennis player Madison Keys 7-5, 7-5 to move into the fourth round of the Miami Open here.

In the first set, the Spaniard was able to deal with relentless attacks by Keys, who nevertheless failed on all 10 of her attempts to break Arruabarrena's service on Sunday, reports Efe.

The 10th game was especially dicey, with Keys going ahead 15-40 before Arruabarrena pulled even and then managed to come out on top.

Arruabarrena managed to break Key's serve and went ahead 6-5, ultimately winning the final game to take the first set.

In her first appearance at the Miami Open, the Spaniard gave a great performance against a formidable rival although the American had resoundingly defeated her in their only prior match in Acapulco in 2014, when Keys cleaned up against Arruabarrena in just 44 minutes 6-1, 6-0.

During Sunday's match, Keys asked for a physical therapist to examine her during play to treat pain in her right shoulder. Moreover, she is also coming off wrist surgery.

Nevertheless, Keys managed to get out in front of the Basque player 0-3 in the second set before the latter battled back to 3-3, then grabbed two more games and served in the 10th game.

However, the American broke her serve at that point, only to have Arruabarrena break her right back.

And finally, it appeared that nothing could stop Arruabarrena from securing the final games to take the second set, thus moving to the fourth round, where she will go up against Briton Johanna Konta, who had beaten Pauline Parmentier of France 6-4, 6-0.

Meanwhile, also on Sunday, Germany's top-ranked Angelique Kerber moved to the fourth round, defeating 61st-ranked American Shelby Rogers 6-4, 7-5, after the latter had gone up 2-4 in the second set.

Also, Russia's Svetlana Kuznetsova downed American Taylor Townsend 6-4, 6-2 in a third-round match and 11th-ranked Venus Williams won her own third-round match-up against Patricia Tig of Romania 6-3 and 6-0.