Leylah Fernandez slumps out of Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships against Jasmine Paolini as Maria Sakkari snaps losing streak

As Day Three begins at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, there have been wins for among others Jasmine Paolini and Maria Sakkari who take their place in the Last 16 (Third Round) with the former dumping out Leylah Fernandez.

Fairly matched in terms of rankings with both hovering around the top 30 mark, Fernandez though has been in ultra impressive form as of late an so was expected to carry that on this week. But she hasn't been able to falling with ease 6-3, 6-4 in favour of Paolini who sealed the win in just over an hour and a half. The Italian ace came from 4-1 down in the second set to seal the win and not allow a third set and is now back into the top 25 of the WTA Live Rankings at least.

Sakkari on the other hand flew through against a tough opponent in Emma Navarro. The American has been consistently making strides in recent months, but in the first match since ditching coach Tom Hill, the Greek sealed a 6-2, 6-4 win. It concluded an eight match losing streak against top 30 players.

Also ironically after falling out of the top 10 for the first time since 2021, she will return there next week already. This after sealing her first win in Dubai so she technically wasn't defending any points. Also wins this morning for Magdalena Frech over Petra Martic and also Marketa Vondrousova prevailed in three sets over American ace, Peyton Stearns. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova seemed to hit a wall too with Liudmila Samsonova handed a walkover before they got onto the court.