Wednesday's action at the Dongfeng Voyah Wuhan Open delivered high drama across the board as world number one Aryna Sabalenka returned to competition for the first time since her US Open triumph. The defending champion survived a rusty opening set to advance, while Linda Noskova continued her remarkable run from Beijing by upsetting Naomi Osaka. Jessica Pegula needed seven match points to escape Hailey Baptiste in an epic three-setter, while Coco Gauff provided the day's most dominant performance with an express victory. The race for WTA FInals is becoming the hottest topic as the battle for 8th and last spot becomes tight. Here is the recap from today with complex preview of Thursday's Round of 16 matches.
Sabalenka survives first match since US Open
Top-ranked Aryna Sabalenka overcame early struggles to defeat unseeded Rebecca Sramkova 4-6 6-3 6-1 in almost two hours, successfully defending her perfect 18-0 record in Wuhan. The defending champion and three-time tournament winner looked visibly rusty in the opening stages after more than a month away from competitive tennis, losing the first set as the Slovakian played an inspired opening hour.
Sabalenka definitely showed holiday rust at the very start and took her about a set to get a proper read on Sramkova's serve. The 68th-ranked Slovakian came out firing, stepping inside the court and hitting winners from all angles to dominate the opening set. Both players finished with more winners than unforced errors, with Sramkova producing an excellent first set display - while Sabalenka wasn't quite fully on song, she wasn't spraying the ball either, as her opponent was simply outplaying her. The Belarusian struggled particularly on return, facing consistent depth and pace from the Slovak veteran.
The turning point came in the fourth game of the second set when Sabalenka finally found her rhythm and broke serve to take a 3-1 lead. From that moment, the world number one stepped up significantly, finding better court position and starting to unleash her trademark power. Sabalenka broke her opponent in the opening game of the final set and never looked back, dominating proceedings as Sramkova's level dropped noticeably after her strong start. The Belarusian converted her second match point after controlling the third set with aggressive baseline play.
While Sramkova hardly ever seems to sustain her momentum and never really seals the deal against top players, missing numerous chances to make it more competitive, Sabalenka showed good recovery and changed up the return game intelligently. There was no major panic from the champion once she settled into the match, just a methodical improvement in quality as she found her range. The victory extends Sabalenka's remarkable Wuhan record to 19-0 across four tournaments, having won titles in 2018, 2019 and 2024. The 16th seed Liudmila Samsonova will be her opponent on Thursday. The Russian holds record of 14-13 on hard courts this year - not impressive as for the top 20 player. She defeated the recent WTA 500 Guadalajara finalist Emiliana Arango in straights and surpassed Sofia Kenin, coming back from a set down to win by 3-6 6-3 6-1.
Noskova continues Beijing form defeating Osaka
Linda Noskova continued her remarkable run by defeating 11th seed Naomi Osaka 7-6(2) 6-3 in one hour and 28 minutes, securing her 10th top 20 victory of 2025 in her first week as a top 20 player herself. The 20-year-old Czech showed no signs of fatigue despite playing her Beijing final against Amanda Anisimova just three days ago, following up with a grueling three-set win over Yulia Putintseva in the first round.
The match was dominated by serve, with just one break of serve in the entire contest - and crucially, it went to Noskova in the penultimate game of the second set, allowing her to close out the victory with an emphatic hold to 15. The Czech saved both only break points she faced throughout the match, demonstrating excellent composure under pressure. The opening set alone lasted over an hour as both powerful servers held comfortably, but Noskova proved clutch in the tiebreak, racing to a 7-2 advantage as Osaka's level dipped at critical moments. Statistics showed a tight contest with Noskova producing 18 winners to Osaka's 20, and both players having positive record in compare to unforced errors (Noskova's 13 to Osaka's 14). The key difference came in the crucial points - Noskova's tiebreak record has improved dramatically this season from 12-8 in 2024 to 14-4 in 2025, and she added another impressive performance to that tally. The Czech particularly excelled behind her first serve, which proved to be her most effective weapon against Osaka's strong returning game. Pressure points stats reflect how much serving fest it was - Noskova faced just 9 pressure points, winning 8 of them, Osaka played only 7 pressure points on serve but won just 2 of them, crucial ones in her last service game occurred to be decisive.
For Osaka, it's a disappointing end after her gutsy comeback victory over Leylah Fernandez in the first round, which had marked her first-ever win in Wuhan. The four-time Grand Slam champion had been building momentum with 12 wins in her last 15 matches, but couldn't find a way past the inspired Czech youngster. Noskova advances to face either Elena Rybakina or Jaqueline Cristian in the third round, looking for back-to-back WTA 1000 quarterfinals.
Pegula's struggles, Gauff's express win
Jessica Pegula needed nearly three hours to defeat fellow American Hailey Baptiste 6-4 4-6 7-6(6) after squandering six match points. The sixth seed was twice broken while serving for the match in the third set but showed tremendous mental strength to prevail in a gripping tiebreaker, converting her seventh match point to advance.
Pegula cruised through the opening set with confident baseline play, breaking Baptiste twice to establish control. The momentum shifted dramatically in the second set as Baptiste broke Pegula twice to race to leads of 3-0 and 5-2. Though Pegula broke back to narrow the gap to 5-4 - prompting visible frustration from Baptiste - the 23-year-old regrouped and converted her second set point after fending off five game points, sealing the set in 52 minutes.
The decider was an unusual showcase of inability to close the encounter by Pegula who had 5-2 lead and appearing to have the match under control. She had her first match point at 5-3, but Baptiste saved it with aggressive play. Then, serving for the match at 5-4, Pegula was broken as Baptiste found her range from the baseline, hitting forehand and serve winners. The American had another four match points at 6-5 but got passive, making sloppy errors as Baptiste took full advantage to level at 5-5. The tiebreak became anyone's match. Baptiste had chances but missed a few crucial shots at wrong times, while Pegula - despite looking tentative - held her nerve to finally convert on her seventh match point. The victory marked Pegula's fifth consecutive three-setter and she will face ninth seed Ekaterina Alexandrova next.
In stark contrast to Pegula's marathon, third seed Coco Gauff produced a clinical performance to demolish Moyuka Uchijima 6-1 6-0 in just 51 minutes. It was a statement display from the Roland Garros champion, who won 55 of 77 points in one of her most dominant victories of the year. It was a super reliable performance of Gauff in compare to her form displayed in recent weeks. She scored 89% of first serve points and avoided any double faults, while hitting average of 6.5 per match during whole season. She also kept her unforced errors to a minimum, tallying just eight while blasting 16 winners to overwhelm the Japanese qualifier. The American meets last standing Chinese in the field - Shuai Zhang. The 36-year-old veteran performed two upsets in three-setters against Emma Navarro and Sorana Cirstea. Continuing this form, Zhang is on a good path to come back into top 100 of WTA rankings, however playing against Gauff in the disposition from Wednesday does not give too much hope for the Chinese to continue her great run.
WTA Race heats up
The race into WTA Finals in Riyadh is still on. Jasmine Paolini keeps the marginal gap behind Elena Rybakina, fighting off a victory in a surprisingly tough match played against world number 109 - Yue Yuan. The Italian approached that tie with a series of 13 wins in last 15 matches, but the home favorite had put the bar up high. The Chinese was very efficient on serve, losing just 4 points in her service game in the opening set, deservingly taking that with a score 6-3 including two breaks gained over Paolini. Yuan continued putting the pressure on favorized opponent, but Paolini denied an early break in second set, making a crucial hold from 15-40 down in second game. Yuan had another breakpoint in 8th game, but ultimately it was Paolini who broke the deadlock of second set, gaining her first break over well-disposed Chinese which extended the match for whole distance. Third set was a festive of tight games and chances for both players, but ultimately Paolini edged her opponent to win by 3-6 6-4 6-3 after a very tough battle.
Next stop for Paolini is Clara Tauson. The Dane sits 11th in WTA Race, but her gap to 8th is more than 1k points. She needs to defeat the Italian to keep the illusory chances for the advance. Tauson approaches that match after two comfortable wins over Antonia Ruzic and Olga Danilovic, which is quite a bounce back after a couple of unsuccessful tournaments with early exits in recent weeks.
Elena Rybakina has started the Wuhan Open 55 points ahead of Jasmine Paolini. However, the vagaries of points distribution (Rybakina played one match less as one of 8th seeds who received byes in opening round), mean that the Kazakh is now 43 points behind the Italian in live WTA Race despite reaching out the same stage of tournament. That puts additional pressure on Rybakina with every match being crucial, but she passed the test on Wednesday, expectedly winning in straight sets by 6-4 6-3. Rybakina won all her service games and fired 11 aces, making the job done in style. Her next challenge will be much more demanding, as she plays Linda Noskova in round of 16. The Czech was expected to run out of gas against Osaka due to her demanding schedule, but as long as the Czech is fit enough, her great run of form makes her surely the dangerous opponent for everyone. That will be another match between players thriving on serve. Both played twice so far with two wins for Rybakina in 2023 and 2024.
Ekaterina Alexandrova sits 10th in the race, trailing more than 700 points to the qualifying spots, but keeps her chances alive after straight sets victories over Viktoria Mboko and Ann Li. The Russian faces Jessica Pegula in a high quality match-up on paper, however the American has 5 exhausting three-setters in a row on her card which is a chance for Alexandrova to make another good run during the Asian swing. She leads H2H against Pegula by 3-2 with the most recent straight sets win in Stuttgart on clay this year.
