Hina Hayata vs Nina Mittelham | WS QF | #WTTSaoJose 2026

Crowd applaud. Both tables before we get going here. It's fast and furious in the first point. Go into a battle of reaction times between the both of them on this pendulum serve. Hayata loves to serve heavy backspin and then spin up with her backhand. These two have met five times internationally. All five times it's gone the way of the Japanese star. Little Hammers won the WTT singles title at contender Lima back in 2022. She's had a few injuries. She's a wonderful server for this year. She's trying to be a lot more positive. This opener's going. Eight of the first ten points go in the way of Japan's Hayata. This is just trying to survive those Hayata serves. Wonderful misdirection. Try and put pressure on her as well because if not she's going to melt the third ball as well. That's better though. Flip the back edge quick to apologize. She'll feel much better about how game two has started. It's another big fast wrap here. Such spin both forehand and backhand. So so good. That is a wonderful counter and a wonderful celebration to go along with it. Half long. It was there like a trap and it rose above the net slightly too high and Hayata just punished it. But this German will not. And the accuracy this time. It's game point now for Hayata and it's a wonderfully half long receive. Because of injury and she's back and loving it. Great to see her back as well in this third game. And again it's a pressure as a challenger to Hayata as well to win points on your own serve. Because she's so strong on her own. This time no it's a long fast serve or it's a deadly short one. It's another long fast. Heavy spin. Good time out so far for Mittleham. But this serve again. You can see how much. It's another factor in this match up here. Hayata's ability to fox Mittleham on the serve. It's wonderful. The German. Things might start to get a little interesting here on table one. And she has done. Wonderful sound from the training hall in the background. Someone's crunching forehands and that ball didn't creep over. The amount of advice being provided. It's a lot of side as well and we're back to 11 all. Will she look to hunt this half long serve if it does come half long. Oh she didn't. She sent it back with all the spin still on it. Mittleham. Full power forehand from Hayata. What a weird point. Or something we didn't see. There's that heavy bronze medalist. She's a master at the backhand spin up. She's not bad at the forehand one either. Starting to stretch the legs out towards the finish line here. Mittleham's already used that time out as well so she's out there all alone. And I said about location. Number one seed through to the semi-finals. The service game so so good in the early games here in this quarterfinal and she applauds and drinks the applause of the audience and rightly so.