Chinese tennis stars Yuan Yue and Wu Yibing reach season highs

Chinese tennis enjoyed a stellar double breakthrough on the international tour on Wednesday. Yuan Yue advanced to the quarterfinals at the WTA 250 Austin tournament with consecutive upset wins, while China men's No 1 Wu Yibing knocked off Japan's Sho Shimabukuro to advance to the final eight at the ATP 500 Acapulco event, both setting personal bests for the season.

Yuan, world No 128, staged a comeback win in the first round to defeat Slovakia's Rebecca Sramkova 4-6, 7-5, 6-1. She then swept past Hungary's Dalma Galfi 6-3, 6-2 in straight sets on Wednesday. With her quarterfinal berth, Yuan has reached her second tour-level quarterfinal this season.

Yuan, the champion of the 2024 WTA Austin singles event and 2025 doubles competition — also in Austin — feels the close connection with the lucky city.

"I gained a lot of friends here," Yuan said with a smile. "They would like to bring to me the barbecue and I think the food gave me a lot of energy."

Yuan will face either Anastasia Zakharova or Ashlyn Krueger in the next round.

Qualifier Wu, world No 142, opened his main-draw campaign at the Abierto Mexicano Telcel by edging Norway's world No 12 and three-time Grand Slam runner-up Casper Ruud 7-6(2), 7-6(1) in two tiebreaks on Tuesday. He followed up with a 6-3, 7-6(4) victory over Shimabukuro in the second round.

Next up for Wu is Italy's Flavio Cobolli, currently ranked No 20 in the world.

The 2025 National Games tennis gold medalist has a proven record against top-20 opponents, having beaten Taylor Fritz and Daniil Medvedev in tiebreaks using a similar game plan in 2023 and last September.

"I think I stayed calm whenever he was putting me under a lot of pressure," Wu said. "Of course, Casper is one of the best players on the Tour in rallies, so I really had to stay patient and aggressive at the same time."