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Top-seeded Ashleigh Barty will meet No. 29 Elena Rybakina in the third round of the Australian Open.
The match, estimated to start at 7 p.m. ET on Thursday, won’t be on TV in the United States, but anyone in the US can watch it live on ESPN+:
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Once signed up for ESPN+, you can then watch Barty vs Rybakina live on your computer via ESPN.com, or on your phone (Android and iPhone compatible), tablet, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, or other streaming device via the ESPN app.
Barty vs Rybakina Preview
Barty dropped her first set of the tournament but hasn’t lost once since — she overcame Ukraine’s Lesia Tsurenko 5-7, 6-1, 6-1 in the first round, then topped Polona Hercog of Slovenia 6-1, 6-4 in the second.
“Another clean match today and I’m really happy to get out of that one,” the Australian said in her on-court interview after besting Hercog, according to ESPN. “It was very different end to end. The wind played a massive factor and Polona has the power to blow you off the court. It was just about me making as many balls as I could.
“It’s nice playing in front of a full crowd and to play on this beautiful court. Thank you very much.”
Hercog pushed Barty to six break points, all in the second set — taking 15-40 advantages in the second, eighth, and 10th games — but never broke through.
“It was good to play the big points well,” Barty said in her post-match press conference, according to the WTA website. “But I think all three of those games were 15-40, which is not really an opportunity I want to give to my opponent, three back-to-back service games, I think it was.
“Obviously nice to be able to get out of those. In those points my structure of points was a lot better. I probably should have done those earlier in the service games. But that was also something I did very well in the first set was get ahead in my own service games and then put the pressure straight back on my opponent.”
Rybakina has yet to drop a set in the tournament, dispensing of the United States’ Bernarda Pera 6-3, 6-2 in the first round before besting Greet Minnen of Belgium 6-3, 6-4 in the second.
The 20-year-old, who was born in Russia but began representing Kazakhstan in 2018, rose from No. 186 in the world at the start of 2019 to No. 37 by season’s end, winning the Bucharest Open. She’s lost just once in 11 matches in 2020, jumping No. 36 to No. 26 — she reached the final of the Shenzhen Open, then won the Hobart International.
“Last year I started to focus on tennis much more because before I was still in school,” Rybakina said, per the WTA website. “It was not easy for me because I couldn’t skip school. I didn’t have a coach who could travel with me.
“So now I’m focusing for the last year only on tennis and I have a great coach. He’s helping me a lot. We started working in February and we improved a lot of things. With his help, it’s working.”