1) Qinwen is following in the footsteps of her idol

China’s Qinwen Zheng outlasted Emma Navarro and saved a match point in the longest match of the Olympic Tennis Event so far, needing 3 hours 10 minutes to defeat her American opponent 6-7(7) 7-6(4) 6-1 in a thriller on Court 7.

Zheng, the second Chinese player to reach an Olympic singles quarter-final after Li Na at Beijing 2008, also revealed just how much it means to her to follow in the footsteps of her childhood inspiration.

“She's one of the women who inspired me the most,” said Zheng. “I always said she put those dream seeds inside me. The day when Li Na won a Slam, I had a dream in my heart that I want to win a Grand Slam as well.

“And, this time, I'm fighting for my country, it’s the same importance, even more. Chinese people, we love our country and I always feel so honoured I have the chance to fight for China.”

With the high temperatures in Paris on Tuesday, this was the first match of the day to include a 10-minute break between the second and third sets, a measure possible as part of the ITF’s extreme weather policy.

2) Age is just a number for Kerber

Angelique Kerber’s retirement plans continue to be delayed after the German beat Canada’s Leylah Fernandez to book her place in the quarter-finals. In three Olympic appearances, Kerber, the Rio 2016 silver medallist, has never failed to reach the last eight.

“Already against Naomi (Osaka) it was a great win for me, but we are here at the Olympics, my last tournament, which is really special,” she said. “For me it doesn’t matter against who I’m playing, I just want to play good tennis playing on a high level again, and of course it helps if you win matches like that.”

Thirty-six-year-old Kerber is the oldest women’s singles quarterfinalist since tennis returned to the Games in 1988, and she’s six years older than the woman who previously held that distinction: Serena Williams, who was 30 when she went all the way to gold at London 2012.

The German is also the oldest woman left in the Paris 2024 singles draw by nearly six years – the next oldest is USA’s Danille Collins, who has already said that she’ll retire later this year.

Next up for Kerber is 21-year-old Zheng, the youngest woman remaining in the draw.

3) Fritz has one eye on the future

Despite being the only player who could still leave Paris 2024 with three medals round his neck, USA’s Taylor Fritz admitted he was particularly keen to play at this year’s Olympics so that he wouldn’t be making his Games debut on home turf in Los Angeles.

“I don’t know where I’m going to be in four years. I’m going to be 30. I hope I’m going to play in LA and, if I do, I wouldn’t want that to be my first Olympics,” explained Fritz, who is through to the third round of the men’s singles and is into the second round in both the men’s doubles and mixed doubles.

“I want to get this experience and really give myself the absolute best chance to perform in LA when I’m 30. I think that’s going to be a great opportunity for me. Being here is a great experience for that.”

4) Kostyuk serves up a win for Ukraine

After the loss of her compatriot Elina Svitolina, it was over to Marta Kostyuk to keep Ukrainian hopes alive in the women’s singles and she delivered, with a hard-fought 46 76(5) 64 win against Greece’s Maria Sakkari lasting 2 hours 47 minutes.

“Obviously very emotional,” she said afterwards. “I couldn’t really serve today, and it was incredibly tough mentally to push through this match.”

“I’m very happy with the way I handled it and I’ll carry this win for sure forever with me.”

Kostyuk made use of the underarm serve, which incidentally in French is called ‘service à la cuillère’ – which translates literally as ‘service with a spoon’.

She is not impressed with her scooping technique, however: “I still have to practise it because it’s not good enough, this serve, but thank god I don’t use it often, so, maybe I will not use it again.”

5) Anna Karolina Schmiedlova saves her very best for her country… against Italians

Anna Karolina’s upset victory over Jasmine Paolini on an energy-sapping Tuesday in sweltering Paris was her second Top 10 win and came eight years after her last which, coincidentally, also came against an Italian at an Olympic Games.

Schmiedlova’s previous-best win was at Rio 2016 when she dispatched then-world No. 8 Roberta Vinci in straight sets in the first round.

Surprisingly, perhaps, (given her compatriot and former world No. 5 Daniel Hantuchova played at Athens 2004, Beijing 2008 and London 2012 and is deeply fond of the Olympic Games) the 29-year-old has become the first Slovak player – man or woman – to reach the quarter-finals of the Olympic Tennis Event since Miloslav Meric won gold at Seoul 1988.

Magic.