Felix Auger-Aliassime falls in Adelaide semis
Fellow Canadian Dabrowski loses to former playing partner in doubles final
Canada's Felix Auger-Aliassime lost a tight semifinal against a red-hot opponent on Friday at the Adelaide International.
The No. 2 seed from Montreal fell 7-6 (5), 6-7 (7), 6-4 to No. 3 seed Andrey Rublev of Russia, who has won 11 matches in a row.
Rublev saved nine of 10 break points and finally prevailed in just under three hours at the Australian Open tuneup event.
Auger-Aliassime, 19, fell just short of joining Alexander Zverev as only the second player since 2008 to reach four ATP Tour finals as a teenager.
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The Canadian, ranked 22nd in the world, saved eight of 10 break points, but lost a key game on serve to go down 5-4 in the third set. Rublev then won on serve to finish it.
Rublev, who will face South African Lloyd Harris in the final, is the first player since 2004 to reach back-to-back finals in the first two weeks of the season.
The 27 year old from Ottawa, alongside Croatia's Darija Jurak, lost to her former playing partner Yifan Xu and Nicole Melichar 2-6, 7-5, 10-5 in the women's doubles final.
Dabrowski and Jurak appeared poised to close it out, up 5-3 in the second set. However, Xu and Melichar managed to save two match points en route to winning four straight games to force a super tiebreaker — that they would win to secure the title.
The Ottawa native is expected to play doubles with Latvia's Jelena Ostapenko at the upcoming Australian Open. Dabrowski and Ostapenko won the Qatar Open in February 2018 in their fourth tournament as a pairing. Ostapenko was a late substitute for Xu, who was nursing a back injury at the time.
Dabrowski will also play mixed doubles in Melbourne with Croatian Mate Pavic. The pair has played plenty of Grand Slams together — including a championship run during the 2018 Australian Open.
Barty storms back
In women's singles, world No. 1 Ash Barty came from a set down to beat American Danielle Collins 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (5) in the semis.
Barty will meet world No. 24 Dayana Yastremska in Saturday's final after the 19-year-old Ukrainian beat Aryna Sabalenka 6-4, 7-6 (4).
"It was probably my first real taste [this year] of some adrenaline late in matches," Barty said. "And that is what we're after, to try and practice those things as best we can. I felt like I did what I wanted to do well tonight and got over the line."
Barty beat Yastremska in their only previous meeting last year in Miami.
"I had a good preseason, I worked on a lot of things and I think that's paying off ... each game, I'm playing better and better," Yastremska said.