The stage is set for a bolter at the Brisbane International after the tournament’s top three women’s seeds crashed out with injury problems.
Enter American qualifier Samantha Crawford, the 20-year-old from Atlanta who posted a career-best victory over No.7 seed Belinda Bencic in the second round.
Even her quarterfinal opponent Andrea Petkovic admitted she would need to resort to “classic YouTube stalking” to get the inside word on her opponent, ranked No.154 in the world and with precious little big-game experience.
Crawford won three qualifying matches before upsetting Bencic 7-5, 6-4 on Wednesday, the result putting her into a final eight that, while still tricky, is a littler easier without big guns Maria Sharapova and Simona Halep on her side of the draw.
“She won a lot of matches already so she must be in a good groove,” Petkovic said after beating Russia’s Ekaterina Makarova 7-5, 6-4.
“My coach, he watched almost the whole match until he came out on court, so I’m going to talk to him and listen to what he’s got to say.”
Right-handed baseliner Crawford, meanwhile, sounds like she will be flat out keeping her emotions in check when she confronts a packed Pat Rafter Arena crowd on Thursday.
“I was warming up before and I was like, oh, wow,” she said.
“Hopefully I’m a little more used to it and a little more comfortable.”
German Angelique Kerber, who is now the tournament’s highest remaining seed, takes on Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova while Italy’s Roberta Vinci battles Belarusian Victoria Azarenka in the other women’s quarterfinals on Thursday.
In the men’s, Roger Federer will get his 2016 campaign started against Germany’s Tobias Kamke, while Canadian Milos Raonic will do the same against Croatian Ivan Dodig.Former Wimbledon semifinalist Grigor Dimitrov will be determined to mount a charge back towards the top 10 when he meets world No.22 Viktor Troicki of Serbia today. The 24-year-old Bulgarian, now ranked 28th, reached the semifinals in Brisbane last year and the final in 2013. He opened his 2016 account with his first win over Gilles Simon in five attempts and was triumphant the only time he has taken on the Serb.
The 29-year-old Troicki surged 80 places in the rankings last season and won the first all-qualifier final in ATP World Tour history in Sydney, for his second career title. He also finished runner-up in the Stuttgart final.