British number two Heather Watson beat world number 55 Donna Vekic to make the semi-finals of the Hobart International in Australia.

Watson won 6-0 6-4 to reach her second WTA Tour semi-final since winning the Monterrey Open in March 2016.

The world number 74, who won the title in Tasmania in 2015, had a 6-0 5-0 lead but had to dig deep as her Croatian opponent won four games in a row.

Watson, 25, will face defending champion Elise Mertens on Friday.

The Briton last reached the semi-finals of a tour event at Eastbourne in 2017.

“My confidence is very high at the moment,” Watson said. “At the beginning of the year, you want a lot of matches and that’s definitely what I’ve gotten the last two weeks.

“Every match I play, I feel like I’m getting better and better, tennis-wise and mentally.”

Wimbledon champion Garbine Muguruza has pulled out of the Sydney International with a thigh injury, five days before the start of the Australian Open.

The 24-year-old reached the quarter-finals with a 6-3 7-6 (8-6) win over Netherlands’ Kiki Bertens, 26.

But the top seed, who called for a medical timeout after the third game, withdrew hours after her victory.

“Since the start I felt a little bit my abductor,” the Spaniard said after claiming her first win of the season.

“I already felt it in Brisbane, so I thought I was going to be much better, but it came back.

“You always have to adapt. Sometimes you don’t need to have a pain. You just want to play a certain style of game or some tactic.”

• Djokovic returns a week before Australian Open
• British number two Watson through in Hobart

Despite only converting three of the 13 break-point opportunities in the second set, Muguruza sealed victory on her fourth match point in the tie-break.

It was a first win in four meetings with Bertens for Muguruza, who retired from last week’s Brisbane International with cramps.

Britain’s Heather Watson is through to the quarter-finals of the Hobart International after a 6-2 6-2 win over wildcard Jaimee Fourlis.

The 25-year-old, who won the tournament in 2015, took just an hour and 10 minutes to defeat the Australian, 18.

Watson, who lost only 13 points on serve in the match, now faces world number 55 Donna Vekic from Croatia.

“I felt the match was a lot tougher than the score suggested,” said Watson, the British number two.

“We had a lot of close games and I think just because I’m feeling really confident I was able to come through a lot of those.”

• Muguruza withdraws from Sydney International

Former world number one Novak Djokovic says he intends to play in the Australian Open “for now”.

The Serb returned after six months out with an elbow injury to win 6-1 6-4 against world number five Dominic Thiem, 25, at the Kooyong Classic.

The 30-year-old said he was “very happy with how it went” after his first competitive game since Wimbledon.

When asked if he will play in the Grand Slam that starts next week, he added: “For now, I’m in the tournament.”

• Australian Open: Britain’s Norrie wins but Broady out
• British number two Watson through in Hobart

Djokovic, who has dropped to number 14 in the world, will be chasing a record seventh Australian Open title if he competes in the tournament, which begins on 15 January.

The 12-time Grand Slam champion said potential five-set matches in Melbourne hold some fitness concerns for him.

“There was a doubt, especially after I pulled out of the first week of the year,” said Djokovic, who had not played since retiring in the Wimbledon quarter-finals last July.

“I don’t say I’m at 100%, I can only say that when I get the feel of a tournament.

“Ideally I would have had another tournament before the start of the Open, but it was not meant to be.”

Djokovic, who pulled out of a warm-up tournament in Abu Dhabi last week, easily overpowered Thiem, who only arrived in Melbourne on Monday night after four days in bed with a virus.

“I’m free of fever and healthy again. I’m still jet-lagged and was slow at the beginning of the match but I’ll be fine for the Open,” the Austrian said.

Andy Murray, Victoria Azarenka and Serena Williams have already withdrawn from 2018’s opening Grand Slam while Stan Wawrinka remains a doubt.

Analysis

BBC tennis correspondent Russell Fuller

Djokovic’s busy day concluded with an appearance at the Tiebreak Tens exhibition event on the Margaret Court Arena at Melbourne Park.

The appearance was a brief one as he was well beaten by Lleyton Hewitt in the opening match. He was once again wearing a compression sleeve but there was no strapping on his troublesome elbow, and he appears to be playing without pain.

Rafael Nadal played with the intensity of a Grand Slam final, ultimately losing the final to Tomas Berdych. That’s what two months without competition can do to a man like Nadal.

But there was no Stan Wawrinka. The three-time Grand Slam champion has had knee surgery since his last appearance at Wimbledon and pulled out hours before the start. There is now a major question mark over his participation in the Australian Open.