17:16
Bryan will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s how Naomi Osaka fared in her last match:
Naomi Osaka continued to underscore her status as the favourite to win the US Open title as she won her ninth consecutive match since the tour restart, moving into the semi-finals with a 6-3, 6-4 win against Shelby Rogers.
“I feel pretty good,” Osaka said afterwards. “I think all of the matches were really tough. The scoreline might not suggest it but I’ve had a couple of really hard matches. I think that made me really glad to be in this position right now.”
Osaka entered the court wearing a mask bearing the name of George Floyd, whose killing at the hands of police was the catalyst for her activism. She had previously amplified the names of Elijah McClain, Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin and Breonna Taylor, all high-profile cases of Black people unjustly killed at the hands of police or civilians. After the match, ESPN broadcasted messages from Arbery’s father and Martin’s mother for Osaka.
“I was just trying really hard not to cry,” said Osaka. “For me it’s a bit surreal. It’s extremely touching that they would feel touched by what I’m doing. For me, I feel like what I’ve doing is nothing. It’s a speck of what I could be doing. It was really emotional. I feel like, I don’t know, after I saw it, at first I was a bit in shock. Now that I’m here and I took the time, I don’t know, I’m really grateful and I’m really humbled.”