AUSSIE teenager Maya Joint is one win away from securing her place in the Top 100 after coming from behind against a wayward Alycia Parks in Singapore yesterday. The Hobart International semi-finalist went a set down against the 89th ranked Parks, but came back to secure her place in the Round of 16 at the Singapore Tennis Open.

Joint – who worked her way through qualifying at the event – won 4-6 6-1 7-5 in two hours and two minutes, with the 18-year-old playing a far more steady game. Parks has incredible power and shotmaking, but the reason the 24-year-old has struggled to crack the Top 50 is due to her high unforced error count and inconsistent serve.

Parks hit a whopping 61 unforced errors in the match to just 29 winners, compared to Joint’s far more impressive 16 winners and 18 unforced errors. Parks’ forehand produced 19 winners for 24 unforced errors, while her backhand was far less convincing with an eight and 27 respective difference.

The stats were typical of Parks’ game, with the American far more likely to win the point over the first three shots, whereas the longer the rally went, the more chance Joint had.

Joint started the match a little shaky, broken in her first two games including game three to love, as Parks stormed out to a 3-0 lead. Fortunately for the Australian, she would settle and break back, and though she was able to keep on serve, could not secure a second break of serve.

However that did come in the opening game of the second set where, after racing to an 0-40 lead, was forced to face a fourth break point before finally securing the early break. That gave the 18-year-old confidence as she bolted out to a 5-0 lead. Parks held serve in the sixth game forcing Joint to serve out the set, which she did to love a game later.

The deciding set went on serve for the first 10 games before Joint was able to earn her first break of serve in the set off her fourth break point – including three in the 11th game – to go 6-5 up. She was convincing in holding serve to win the Round of 32 match as the time ticked over the two-hour mark, 4-6 6-1 7-5.

The American-born Joint – who turns 19 in April – moved up to 101st in the live rankings with the victory, and will face the winner of fourth seed Xinyu Wang or her Canadian opponent Rebecca Marino in the second round.

OTHER RESULTS:

Former US Open winner Emma Raducanu suffered a shock loss to Spaniard Cristina Bucsa in a three-hour, five-minute grind. Bucsa won 5-7 7-5 7-5 with seven more winners (40-33) and 11 less unforced errors (30-41) in a huge upset. The world number 101 – who moved into the Top 100 once again – proved too consistent for the Brit who was broken in the penultimate game of the match before Bucsa won with her third match point.

It was not great news for the Australian contingent in Singapore, with both Ajla Tomljanovic and Daria Saville suffering disappointing straight sets losses. They went down to Swiss qualifier Simona Waltert and American Ann Li in the WTA 250 event.

Top seed in Singapore, Anna Kalinskaya made a successful return having pulled out of the Australian Open due to injury, fighting past a determined Caroline Dolehide to win 6-4 4-6 6-2, while fellow seed Maria Camila Osorio Serrano also ousted an American with a 6-1 6-7 6-3 triumph over Bernarda Pera. Qualifiers Dominika Salkova and Mananchaya Sawangkaew were other day one winners.