Jessica Pegula uses home advantage to reach Miami Open quarter-finals

Pegula lives about 30 minutes north of Hard Rock Stadium - driving to the venue each day - and made a fast start against veteran Pole Linette, racing into a 5-0 lead inside 20 minutes before swiftly closing out the first set.

Linette, though, regrouped with a couple of breaks in the second to appear set to force a decider when 5-2 ahead.

However, Pegula, a quarter-finalist at the Australian Open, dug deep to swing the match back in her favour with a run of five straight games to complete an impressive 6-1 7-5 win.

"I love playing on this court, being at home in Florida, in a football stadium, it is just great all round," Pegula said in her courtside interview, broadcast on Amazon Prime Video.

"She is a really good competitor and was not going to let me win easily.

"She picked up her level a bit (in the second set) and mine started to drop, then I started to be more aggressive and got into a rhythm again and was able to reel off some games."

Pegula goes on to face Russian Anastasia Potapova, the world number 26, who beat China's Qinwen Zheng 6-4 7-6 (4). The pair met in the third round at Indian Wells, where Pegula came through in three sets.

Italy's Martina Trevisan also progressed in straight sets after seeing off 2017 French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko 6-3 6-3, while Romanian Sorana Cirstea beat Marketa Vondrousova 7-6 (3) 6-4 to book her quarter-final spot.

Indian Wells champion Elena Rybakina continued her drive for the Sunshine Double as she defeated Belgian Elise Mertens 6-4 6-3 to make it 11 straight match victories and will play Trevisan in the last eight.

Australian Open winner Aryna Sabalenka continued her climb to becoming the number one player in the world after beating 16th seed Barbora Krejcikova in straight sets.

It took the Belarussian just over an hour to win 6-3 6-2 as she showed a flawless performance, not dropping a service game.

Sabalenka will next play Romanian Sorana Cirstea, who won in straight sets against Marketa Vondrousova 7-6 6-4.

Cirstea, who is ranked 74th in the world, will be hoping to continue her good form that took her through to the quarter-finals at Indian Wells.

Elsewhere, it took two hours for two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova to overcome Varvara Gracheva 7-5 7-6.

Kvitova will face Ekaterina Alexandrova after Canada's Bianca Andreescu badly rolled her ankle and left the court in a wheelchair.

The Russian 18th seed Alexandrova won the first set in a tie-break but was down 2-0 in the second set when Andreescu went down with injury.

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