Tonight’s women’s singles semi-finals (or later today over in Paris) are all set at Court Phillipe Chatrier where four players will become two for a shot on Saturday’s big final – it’s Karolina Muchkova v Aryna Sabalenka followed by Iga Swiatek v Beatriz Haddad Maia. We saw Beatriz Haddad Maia rise up from the opening set down to beat Ons Jabeur after she held on really well that went all the way through the tiebreak as not only she set up the 3rd set decider, but she too has won as well (3-6, 7-6 (7-5 tiebreak) & 6-1). And not too long later, Iga Swiatek got away with a competitive opening stage battle v Coco Gauff before she was being too good in straight sets (6-4, 6-2).
Jabeur is disappointed with the loss there after an easy start. However, she struggled to build on that good start where not only she couldn’t find the sweet spot going into the 3rd set decider, but was also easily run down by Maia in the end as well. Speaking of Maia, she had a great game to turn this around from the 1st down. She might have built that momentum that late before Jabeur had that 1-0 lead, but grasped her opponent’s game well to stay in the fight before these two lifelines gave Maia the better pull towards punching that semi-finals ticket.
Meanwhile, Gauff showed some excellent response from the beginning to keep Swiatek in check, especially when facing such a difficult opponent who is the top-ranked seed of this draw. But then her momentum began to go downhill where not only she fell short ahead of Set 2, but just couldn’t hold on under pressure before it was too late. Meanwhile, Swiatek was really patient along the way that allowed her to find some time before she found that checkpoint with the opening set lead. And that puts her in a great position with the 1-0 advantage going into the 2nd set where she was good in the end.
