Tennis Super Star Naomi Osaka Crashes Out of Berlin On First Round On June 18, the Japanese suffered a three-set first-round loss to sixth seed Zheng Qinwen of China in the WTA 500 Berlin event, a grass-court build-up to Wimbledon in July. Zheng, this season’s Australian Open runner-up, gave Osaka a 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 lesson to set up a round-of-16 meeting against Katerina Siniakova.
The duo had played each other only recently, with the Chinese winning in straight sets on the Italian Open clay in May.“Naomi Osaka is always one of the greatest players. She has a strong serve, she hits hard. It’s never easy to play against her,” said Zheng, who fired a WTA season-high 23 aces.“Honestly for me it doesn’t matter who I play.I’ve now played her on every surface. She will be a formidable foe in the opening round. I’m glad I tried my hardest today.
Zheng now holds a 2-1 advantage in their head-to-head record after winning on clay and grass but losing in San Jose in 2022 on hard courts.
Osaka’s loss comes after she was defeated 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (7-3) by Canadian Bianca Andreescu last week in the’s-Hertogenbosch grass-court tournament quarterfinals.
With two Grand Slam victories apiece in the Australian and US Opens, the former world No. 1 has none on the other two surfaces.
She has never made it past the third round at both Wimbledon and the French Open, and will need to magically find form ahead of the third Grand Slam of 2024 at the All England Club in July.In men’s tennis, Australia’s Jordan Thompson caused an early upset at the Queen’s Club tournament in London with a first-round win over seventh-seed Holger Rune on June 17.Thompson came from a set down to beat his Danish opponent – a semi-finalist last season – 4-6, 7-6 (7-4), 6-3.Former Wimbledon runner-up Milos Raonic survived two match points in a marathon third-set tie-break before beating Britain’s Cameron Norrie 7-6 (8-6), 3-6, 7-6 (11-9).Injuries have seen the Canadian slip from No. 3 in the world rankings to 186.Despite this, the 33-year-old continues to possess one of the strongest serves in the game, having hit 47 aces overall—a record for an ATP match that is best-of-three.Raonic’s thunderbolts, which could reach speeds of up to 225 km/h, proved to be too much for Norrie. The ATP said that Raonic stated he “needed every single one of those” aces.
