Ostapenko wins on return

Back on a tennis court for the first time since her French Open heroics, Jelena Ostapenko continued her winning ways.

The 20-year-old, who stunned Simona Halep – and the entire tennis world – to win her maiden Grand Slam title at Roland Garros, faced Carla Suarez Navarro at Eastbourne and collected another W.

On a surface vastly different than the one she dominated on in Paris, Ostapenko recorded a scratchy 6-3 0-6 6-4 win over the Spaniard to move through to the last 16.

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Yet Ostapenko has always been comfortable on grass – she was a Wimbledon junior champion in 2014 – and will next face either No.5 seed Johanna Konta or Sorana Cirstea, who play on Tuesday.

“I was feeling good but it’s very tough. It’s different conditions and a completely different surface from clay. You have to get used to it because it’s my first match on grass this year. I’m happy about the win,” she told WTA Insider.

Jelena Ostapenko records 30th win of 2017!

Battles past Suárez Navarro 6-3, 0-6, 6-4! #AegonInternational pic.twitter.com/NLm853ADXk

— WTA (@WTA) June 26, 2017

“I think I had enough rest (after Roland Garros) and then I started to prepare for grass. I think it was fine.

“I started pretty well and was playing very aggressively. For most of the first set, I was barely missing, hitting a lot of winners.”

“The second set was more of a struggle. Carla played better, she wasn’t missing and she was playing more aggressively. In the third, I was just trying to play aggressive because it’s a grass court. That helped me in the end.”

“I just want to get as many matches on grass as possible to prepare for Wimbledon. This is a warm-up tournament, after all.”

In other results in Eastbourne, Heather Watson scored just the second top-10 victory over her career by beating No.4 seed Dominika Cibulkova in the second round.

Watson’s 7-5 6-4 win sets up a last-16 clash with Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, who beat Elise Mertens in three sets.

Karolina Pliskova, the highest seed in action on Monday at No.3, brushed aside Alison Riske.

Eugenie Bouchard fell in three sets to Czech Barbora Strycova while Naomi Osaka thrashed fellow Japanese player Risa Ozaki 6-0 6-1 in just 54 minutes.