Fourth seed and former finalist Simona Halep has secured a place in the last eight of the Australian Open after a straight-sets win over Elise Mertens 6-4 6-4.

The match was anything but comfortable for the Romanian, who found herself a break down up the first set, and two up in the second but was pushed to the limit by Mertens who produced more overall winners in the match. 

Halep sighted the match the two played in Doha last year as the reason she managed to get over the line.

"I played Elise in the Doha final last year - I led by a set and was up 4-2 but lost the match," she said.

"I knew I had to stay focused today. I was a little nervous at 4-3 but was strong enough to finish."

Perhaps this year could be Halep’s time for Melbourne glory, having previously lost in the final of the 2018 tournament to the now-retired Caroline Wozniaki. Halep has won two Grand-Slam tournaments since that match, the French Open in 2018 and Wimbledon last year. She has been ranked world number one on two separate occasions and is yet to drop a set in this tournament.

All these factors suggest that Halep could be the one to beat at this stage of the competition, but she faces another stern test against the 28th seed Anett Kontaveit in the next round.

Elsewhere, world number one and home crowd favourite Ashleigh Barty is through to the quarter-finals where she will face former Grand-Slam champion Petra Kvitova.

Another strong contender is the former French Open and Wimbledon champion Garbine Muguruza. The Spaniard started the tournament badly, losing the first set of her first round tie againt Shelby Rogers 0-6 but recovered and has looked ruthless ever since. In round three, Muguruza dispatched the fifth-seed Elina Svitolina 6-1 6-2 and faces Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in her quarter-final match-up.