Tennis: Monica Niculescu, semifinalist in doubles event at Hobart (WTA)

The pairing made of Romanian tennis player Monica Niculescu and Chinese player Zhaoxuan Yang qualified on Wednesday for the doubles event of the WTA tournament of Hobart, Australia, with total prizes worth 250,000 USD, after they won 6-1, 6-4 against Romanian - Kazakh pair Raluca Olaru/Galina Voskoboeva.

The third seeds won in one hour and 12 minutes and secured a 1,718 USD-dollar cheque and 110 WTA points for doubles.

In the last but one act, Niculescu and Yang will play against the winners of the match Hao-Ching Chan/Latisha Chan (Taiwan/1st Seed) - Dalila Jakupovic (Slovenia)/Sabrina Santamaria (USA).

Also on Wednesday, second seeded pairing Irina Begu/Mihaela Buzarnescu will play in the quarterfinals against Anastasia Potapova (Russia)/Daiana Iastremska (Ukraine).

Niculescu was a doubles champion at Hobart in 2012 and 2014, Begu in 2014 and Olaru in 2017. AGERPRES (RO - author: Mihai Tenea, editor: Vlad Constantinescu; EN - author: Adina Panaitescu; editor: Cristina Zaharia)