For the first time in three years, the tennis world will see Naomi Osaka in the third round of a Grand Slam.
The two-time Australian Open champion advanced to the third round of the tournament on Wednesday with an upset 1-6, 6-1, 6-3 win over No. 20 seed Karolina Muchová. The win was also a reversal of the pair’s meeting in the 2024 US Open, which Muchová won 6-3, 7-6.
Osaka will face former top five player Belinda Bencic in the third round.
One more win would be Osaka’s first appearance in a Grand Slam fourth round since her win at the 2021 Australian Open, which feels like much more than four years ago. That was the year Osaka took a hiatus from tennis after a French Open controversy where she said she would forego media appearances out of mental health concerns.
Osaka took another hiatus after a rough exit from the US Open that year and further struggled in 2022. She stepped away from tennis to give birth to her daughter in 2023 and struggled to return to form upon returning last year.
The obstacles continued for Osaka in Melbourne this year. She broke up with the father of her daughter, rapper Cordae, last week, withdrew from her final tune-up tournament, the Auckland Open, the previous week due to an apparent abdominal issue, and is currently facing the prospect of losing her house to the wildfires in Los Angeles.
After her first-round win over Caroline Garcia, she said she had to send someone to retrieve her daughter’s birth certificate, via ESPN:
“Honestly I don’t think I’ve been doing the greatest keeping focus, but obviously I won, so I think it’s an acceptable job,” Osaka said about dividing her thoughts between Los Angeles and the tournament where she’s competing. “It is really difficult for me … because I find now my home is more of a home because I have memories with my daughter. There’s so many things — keepsakes and stuff like that.”
Despite all that, Osaka took a step forward she had been waiting years to take.