Katie Boulter wins close competition to reach Hong Kong Open quarter-finals | Katie Boulter

Katie Boulter continued to rediscover her form in the final weeks of her season as she reached the quarter-finals of the Hong Kong Open with a hard-fought 7-6 (7), 6-4 victory over China’s Xiyu Wang.

Boulter endured a challenging few months after Wimbledon, compiling a 6–8 record between July and mid-October while failing to win consecutive matches at any event. But while many of Boulter’s peers have already started their off-season, her decision to play an extended Asian swing has paid off.

After reaching the semi-finals of the Tokyo WTA 500 event last week, Boulter has now put together two solid performances in Hong Kong, a WTA 250 event, against lower-ranked opponents. Wang, ranked No. 100 in the world, has been Boulter’s only top 100 opponent in her five wins over the past two weeks, but simply winning matches has allowed her to build her confidence and she has also a useful number of points.

“It was quite a battle,” Boulter said. “She’s an incredible opponent, she never gives up. Full credit to her, she just keeps hitting and she’s so skilled. She made me work so hard today, which I’m not too happy about to be honest.”

This time, victory required Boulter to navigate a marathon 78-minute opening set, in which Boulter recovered from a 2-4 break-down to force a tiebreak. Wang is a tall, imposing 23-year-old who has been highly touted for a long time and possesses a massive left forehand. She refused to let Boulter go, eventually generating the first set point at 6-5 on Boulter’s serve.

Boulter saved the set point with a brilliant second serve down the tee, forcing a return error from Wang before she could clear the tiebreak on her second set point. Despite breaking serve early in the second set, Boulter was never comfortable, but after giving up the break at 4-3 with a double fault following a lengthy service game, Boulter steadied and took the final two games of the match.

“I’m honestly just a little bit too stubborn with myself to let go,” Boulter said. “I wish I could relax a little bit, but I just wanted to keep fighting and keep doing the best I could. She played some great tennis. A lot of power, a lot of finesse in her strokes. I just had to stay there as much as I possibly could. I’m proud of myself today.”

In her penultimate tournament of the season, Boulter, the second seed, will face either No. 7 seed Varvara Gracheva or Anastasia Zakharova for a place in the semifinals.