Osaka storms back to beat Putintseva in Beijing to advance to Round 3

BEIJING -- Former No.1 Naomi Osaka engineered a confident comeback to defeat No.21 seed Yulia Putintseva in the second round at the China Open on Friday. Osaka, a champion in 2019, came from a set down to win 3-6, 6-4, 6-2.

It was her first successful comeback in over two years, snapping a 22-match losing streak after losing the first set. 

Beijing: Scores | Order of Play | Draws

"I heard that stat from my agent," Osaka told reporters, "and I wanted to break it really bad because I knew that I also had a stat about three-setters before I took my break, so that was really important to me.

"I also wanted to show myself that I could win a match and fight without playing as perfect as I wanted to."

The victory extends her win streak at the China Open to eight matches. It is the first time Osaka has won back-to-back matches since June at 's-Hertogenbosch.

Osaka will face No.60 Katie Volynets next. 

Facing each other for the second time this season, Putintseva looked the sharper player through the first set. She patiently forced Osaka to play through the rallies, offering a variety of different paces and spins to keep the former No.1 off-balance. Putintseva broke first by taking advantage of an error-strewn three-game spell from Osaka. From 2-1 down, Putintseva won 12 of the next 14 points before breaking Osaka for a second time to close out the set. 

"I just told myself to keep fighting," Osaka said on court. "I traveled all the way here so it would be a little bit injustice to myself to not try as hard as I can. So just tried to dig deep."

Osaka misfired on 19 unforced errors in the first set and served at just 50 percent. But she reset quickly to earn and win her first break point in the match in the opening game of the second set. Putintseva leveled the set at 4-4, but with Osaka growing in confidence and cleaning up her baseline game, the four-time major champion sealed the final two games of the set to take the match to a decider.

"I'm just trying to be overwhelmingly confident in my abilities," Osaka said, "because I think I did lose that along the way this year just from losing a lot matches, which is a very human thing to do." 

With Putintseva reeling, Osaka pounced. She opened up a 3-0 lead and protected from there, closing out the 1-hour and 46-minute match on her third match point. After hitting 19 unforced errors in the first set, she hit a combined 18 for the rest of the match, while striking a total of 30 winners. 

With the win, Osaka leveled her career head-to-head against Putintseva to 3-3.

"I'm trying to think this is the last push of the year and I really want to do well and in my career I've always done well here," Osaka said. "Just trying to make the last push before Australia."