{"id":836596,"date":"2026-07-30T19:57:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T19:57:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/836596\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T19:57:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T19:57:12","slug":"osaka-regaining-confidence-after-inhumane-quest-tennis-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/836596\/","title":{"rendered":"Osaka: Regaining Confidence After \u201cInhumane\u201d Quest \u2013 Tennis Now"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Naomi Osaka on regaining confidence in Washington, DC QF run.<\/p>\n<p>By Richard Pagliaro | Thursday, July 30, 2026<br \/>Photo credit: Jeff Dean\/Wick Photography for Mubadala DC Open<\/p>\n<p>Practice makes perfect, but the pursuit of perfection makes Naomi Osaka unsure.<\/p>\n<p>Coming off the best Wimbledon run of her career that saw Osaka knock off No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka en route to the SW19 quarterfinals, the former No. 1 is finding her footing and strengthening self-belief on Washington, DC\u2019s hard courts.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/tennisexpress.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\" noreferrer noopener nofollow\"><img loading=\"lazy\" data-lazyloaded=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"610\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/610X150-Slide_PRO-PLAYER7-13-26.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-68391\" style=\"width:730px;height:auto\"  data-\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Osaka led Ashlyn Krueger, 6-3, 3-1 when the American wild card retired due to injury sending the 28-year-old Japanese into her 38th Tour-level quarterfinal.<\/p>\n<p>Since losing to Sabalenka in the Roland Garros round of 16, Osaka has made quarterfinals or better at three consecutive tournaments.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"adslot inline-ad\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tennisexpress.com\/womens-racquets?utm_source=tennisnow&amp;utm_medium=article_ad&amp;utm_campaign=inarticle_racquets\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Tennis Express<\/p>\n<p>Grass-Court RacquetsThe frames the pros swing<\/p>\n<p>Shop racquets \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The four-time Grand Slam champion says she enters every tournament with one end game: Taking the title home.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI never sign up for a tournament, you know, thinking that I won\u2019t win,\u201d Osaka told the media at the Mubadala DC Open.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, the owner of seven career hard-court titles concedes her own \u201cinhumane\u201d expectation can drain her confidence.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s more for me internally like the level of perfection that I strive towards, it\u2019s kind of inhumane a little bit,\u201d Osaka said. \u201cI always just put that goal on myself in practices, in matches..<\/p>\n<p>\u2018\u201dI would say that\u2019s why I don\u2019t feel, quote, unquote, confident is because, like, there\u2019s always this next thing that I feel like I could keep doing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The third-seeded Osaka will face Italian Elisabetta Cocciaretto for a semifinal spot fueled by the belief she can take anyone down at her best.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI mean, it\u2019s not saying I\u2019m not confident in my abilities,\u201d Osaka said. \u201cI think, you know, if it got down to it, I think I\u2019d give anyone a run for their money.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"adslot inline-ad\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tennisexpress.com\/womens-tennis-apparel?utm_source=tennisnow&amp;utm_medium=article_ad&amp;utm_campaign=inarticle_apparel\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Tennis Express<\/p>\n<p>Wimbledon WhitesOn-court apparel, shipped fast<\/p>\n<p>Shop apparel \u2192<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Richard Pagliaro. Richard Pagliaro is Tennis Now Managing Editor. He is a graduate of New York University and has covered pro tennis for more than 35 years. Richard was tennis columnist for Gannett Newspapers in NY, served as Managing Editor for TennisWeek.com and worked as a writer\/editor for Tennis.com. He has been TennisNow.com managing editor since 2010.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Naomi Osaka on regaining confidence in Washington, DC QF run. By Richard Pagliaro | Thursday, July 30, 2026Photo&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":807945,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-836596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=836596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}