BEIJING -- French Open champion Mirra Andreeva reached the semifinals of the China Open after battling past Ekaterina Alexandrova 7-6 (4), 7-6 (3) on Thursday.
Andreeva had lost her previous two matches against Alexandrova, who rallied back from 4-1 down in the second set and 5-3 down with Andreeva serving for the match.
"I felt like she was playing better and I didn't take my chances. I could have played more aggressive but what a match this was," Andreeva said. "She played unbelievable today, and I'm very happy to get my very first win against her."
The fourth-seeded Andreeva is aiming for a fourth singles title this year and next faces Nikola Bartunkova. She earlier reached her first WTA 1000 semifinal after beating fellow Czech Karolina Muchova 6-3, 6-0.
Bartunkova stamped her authority on the quarterfinal by winning the first five and final seven games of the match against her seventh-seeded opponent en route to her third career win against a top 10-ranked opponent.
Even Bartunkova is surprised by her run of success in the tournament.
"For sure [I didn't expect it] before this tournament," the 20-yera old said after the match. "I played lot of practices with top players -- [iga] Swiatek, [Coco] Gauff, others. Maybe it helps little bit. [It] was one week before the tournament. I tried to play a lot of practices, lot of matches. I think that was the reason I had good preparation for this tournament. So yeah, I had confidence. But honestly I didn't expect these results."
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.