By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Friday August 16, 2019
The hardcourt season took a turn for the worse for World No.1 Naomi Osaka on Friday at Cincinnati, as she struggled with a left knee injury during the second game of the deciding set with Sonya Kenin and was forced to retire a few points later.
Kenin’s 6-4 1-6 2-0 RET victory sends the rising 20-year-old into the semi-finals at Cincinnati. The feisty American has now earned wins against World No.1 players in back-to-back weeks and she will face Madison Keys for a spot in the final on Saturday at Cincinnati.
Keys, who took out Venus Williams 6-2 6-3 on Friday, crushed 32 winners to just three for the 39-year-old Williams in a breathtaking display of power tennis.
For Osaka, the situation is dire and the race to get healthy ahead of the U.S. Open is now on.
“I just started feeling my leg when I landed on my serve,” she said after the match, adding: “We’re still trying to figure it out.”
The World No.1 was in good form this week on her favorite surface and had notched three-set wins over Aliaksandra Sasnovich and Hsieh Su-Wei to improve to 13-2 in third sets this season.
But she’ll have to be careful now, as there is just ten days left between now and the day her title defense is set to begin at the U.S. Open.
“It sucks,” she said. “Especially since I didn't want to, like, get injured this close to the Open. And now I'm kind of, like, worried a little bit.”
She added: “Last year I won the US Open and this year I'm trying to play the US Open. I don't really want to have anything, like, in the way of—I don't even really think about winning the tournament. I just want to have the chance to play it, you know?
“And I feel like this might have that one percent chance of me not being able to play, and that's what's concerning me.”