Poland, USA advance to United Cup semi-finals

Poland and the United States are through to the United Cup semi-finals after scoring quarter-final victories over Great Britain and China respectively.

Hubert Hurkacz got the Poles off to a good start with a 7-6(3), 7-5 win over Billy Harris on Thursday. This was Hurkacz’s first win in three singles matches at this year’s United Cup.

That was followed by world No 2 Iga Swiatek‘s hard-fought 6-7(4) 6-1, 6-4 win in just under three hours over Katie Boulter to give Poland an unbeatable 2-0 lead. Poland will face Kazakhstan for a spot in the United Cup final for the second year in a row.

“This match was crazy,” Swiatek said of her win over Boulter, as quoted by the United Cup website. “So many changes of momentum. I thought I had it under conrol in the first set but for sure I got tight and I didn’t work on it. I didn’t want to repeat the mistake in the third.”

“I tried to keep pushing knowing that I had to keep up the quality,” Swiatek said, “because with quality I wouldn’t have to play these longer rallies if I’m more precise. But for sure it’s harder to be precise under so much pressure. But I made it today. For sure it’s a step forward. In some moments I knew I could be more brave and in the end, I was able to so I was happy.”

Coco did such a good job putting us ahead and giving me the chance to come out and put us through.

Meanwhile, Taylor Fritz sealed the semi-final spot for the United States on Wednesday with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Zhang Zhizhen. That came after world No 3 Coco Gauff got past China’s Zhang Shuai 7-6(4), 6-2.

“Coco did such a good job putting us ahead and giving me the chance to come out and put us through,” said Fritz. “There was a little bit of pressure because I didn’t want to be the one who loses it for the team after Coco won all her matches this week. I played a really solid match. Really happy with it. I felt like I’ve gotten better with each of the matches I’ve played and this match tonight definitely felt like I was back in the flow of how things were feeling at the end of the year.”

The mixed doubles pairing of Desirae Krawczyk and Robert Galloway defeated Zhang and Sun Fajing 6-3, 6-7(1), 10-3 to complete the 3-0 sweep for the Americans, who will face Italy or Czechia in the semi-finals.

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