Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova will do battle with Galina Voskoboeva on Friday for a place in the final four of the Baku Cup 2011

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World No. 13 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova has made it through to the quarter-finals of the WTA Baku Open as expected, and she stands out as a major contender for this week’s title. The Russian was made to work hard in the first set of her second round showdown against Elena Bovina on Thursday, but eventually prevailed with a 6-4, 6-0 victory.

Pavlyuchenkova will now meet Galina Voskoboeva on Friday in the last eight. Voskoboeva wasn’t expected to be amongst the front-runners here in Azerbaijan, but pulled through against fifth seed Monica Niculescu with a 7-6(2), 6-2 success. If she can keep playing this kind of tennis, Voskoboeva could be a real threat to Pavlyuchenkova’s title hopes.

Regardless of this, the Russian is the favourite here. She has only met Voskoboeva once previously in WTA competition, and currently holds a 1-0 head to head record against her. Pavlyuchenkova has shown great improvement since she last took on Voskoboeva, and it’s anticipated that she’ll claim another win against the world No. 162.

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