Sabalenka hoping to reap rewards in 'new start'
Aryna Sabalenka is hoping she can move to another level in a "new beginning" this year after beating Belinda Bencic to reach a first Australian Open quarter-final.
The fifth seed from Belarus saw off Bencic 7-5 6-2 on Rod Laver Arena on Monday and will face Donna Vekic in the last eight.
Sabalenka has not dropped a set in her four matches in the first grand slam of the year at Melbourne Park and has been installed as the favourite to take the title after Iga Swiatek's exit.
The 24-year-old played in a second successive US Open semi-final last year but has never made it is far as a championship match at a major.
Sabalenka won the Adelaide International 1 before heading to Melbourne and is optimistic she can kick on in 2023.
She said: "I want to believe that the way I'm working right now, the way I'm on the court right now, this is the new beginning, and this is the next step. So I really want to believe that it's going to really help me."
Sabalenka has endured struggles with her serve, but appears to have put that behind her after addressing the issue.
She added: "I worked a lot on my serve. I was keep trying, keep believing, keep changing. Then I worked on my, like, biomechanics.
"Basically that's it. But I was doing everything. I thought it's mentally, but it wasn't. We changed a lot of things on how we work on my serve. We tried to work more, less. We tried so many different things.
"In the end of the season when I start working with the biomechanics guy, he helped me a lot. I think from there, everything started to kind of get on that level."
Croatian Vekic ended 17-year-old Czech Linda Fruhvirtova's impressive run with a 6-2 1-6 6-3 victory.
