Two-time Canadian Open champion Simona Halep had to battle past a determined Coco Gauff to reach the semifinals for the fifth time.
The Romanian held off a late charge by the American to secure a 6-4 7-6(2) win which carried her to her 29th WTA semifinal.
Halep led 4-1 in the second set after winning the first and looked to be on her way to a comfortable win only for the teenager to storm back and send the game into a tiebreak. The 30-year-old missed the chance to serve the match twice at 5-4 and 6-5 only to be broken each time.
She regained her composure in time to break the 10th seed’s resistance in the tiebreak to maintain her dominance over the American. In four career meetings, Gauff has yet to take a set off Halep.
In terms of victories, Halep’s 36 wins this year trail only Iga Swiatek (48) and Ons Jabeur (37).
After downing Gauff, Halep will take on another American in the semifinal of the Canadian Open when she squares off against seventh seed Jessica Pegula who earned a 6-3 6-3 win over Kazakh Yulia Putintseva.
Beatriz Haddad Maia, after eliminating world no.1 Iga Swiatek, beat Belinda Bencic to reach the semifinals as well.
In the men’s bracket, Nick Kyrgios’s nine-match winning streak came to an end at the hands of the eighth-seeded Pole Hubert Hurkacz who won 7-6(4) 6-7(5) 6-1.
The Australian was unbeaten since the Wimbledon final while adding the Citi Open trophy to his cabinet before running into Hukacz who improves to 2-0 against Kyrgios.
Hurkacz will next face Norwegian fourth seed Caper Ruud who strolled into the last four by sweeping aside sixth-seeded hometown favourite Felix Auger-Aliassime 6-1 6-2.
