SYDNEY — Belinda Bencic extended her undefeated season-opening streak when she beat Elise Mertens 6-3, 4-6, 7-6 (0) Saturday to put Switzerland ahead 1-0 in the United Cup semifinals over Belgium.
Tournament organizers started play 30 minutes earlier than scheduled with searing temperatures of up to 43 Celsius (109 Fahrenheit) in the forecast for Sydney.
Stan Wawrinka, who will retire at the end of this season, played Zizou Bergs in men’s singles in an attempt to advance Switzerland to Sunday’s final at Ken Rosewall Arena against either the defending champion United States or Poland.
Bencic had won all six sets in her first three matches at the United Cup. She was two games away from another two-set win before Mertens pushed the match the distance.
Then Mertens came from 3-1 down in the third set, saved a pair of break points that would have given Bencic a 4-1 lead, and was two points away from the set win with Bencic serving at 30-30, down 6-5.
But Bencic won the last nine points of the match following a decision to change her racket to a freshly-strung one, taking the match in 2 hours, 37 minutes.
“It feels like 170 kilos fell off my shoulders – I was so stressed; I really wanted to do well, and today I felt so much pressure to not let my team down,” Bencic said.
On the racket change, she said: “My brain turned off and let my instincts take over. I think it was just a feeling.”
Later Saturday in the other semifinal, No. 2-ranked Iga Świątek of Poland was scheduled to face No. 4 Coco Gauff of the United States and Hubert Hurkacz played American Taylor Fritz. A mixed doubles match would be played if the teams were level after the singles.
In the Poland-Australia quarterfinal on Friday, it took a mixed doubles decider to separate the teams.
