New York: Britain's Johanna Konta extended her strong run of Grand Slam results this year by blasting past Chinese 33rd seed Zhang Shuai 6-2, 6-3 to make the US Open last 16 on Friday.
Konta, the 16th seed, equalled her 2015 and 2016 runs to the fourth round in New York and will play former runner-up Karolina Pliskova for a spot in the quarter-finals.
Johanna Konta celebrates her win over Shuai Zhang. Danielle Parhizkaran/USA Today Sports via Reuters
She has experienced middling fortunes on the WTA circuit this season while producing some of her best tennis at the majors, reaching the semi-finals at Roland Garros and then advancing to the last eight at Wimbledon last month.
"I don't think there's necessarily any specific magic click or pill or anything, but I definitely feel like I've been giving myself every opportunity possible to get better and grow," Konta said.
"I don't think I necessarily allowed losing in the first round of Toronto or Cincinnati really to discourage me in any way."
Konta is enjoying a resurgence at Flushing Meadows, where she crashed out in the opening round on her past two appearances.
"I'd like to do even better at Slams obviously. But I think I'm definitely pleased to have made it to the second week of the last three Slams. I think that's a really good achievement for me," she said.
"I think I've had some pretty good results outside of Slams, as well."
Konta lost the Rome final in May to Pliskova and also finished runner-up on the clay at Rabat.
"If I look at it from a big-picture perspective, I've played a lot of matches this year," she said. "I think coming into US Open this year I just tried to keep along the same path more than anything."
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