Halep Storms Back to Reach French Open Semifinals

June 7, 2017 | By New York Tennis Magazine Staff

Romania’s Simona Halep completed a remarkable comeback to reach the French Open semifinals on Wednesday, fighting back for a 3-6, 7-6(6), 6-0 win over fifth-seed Ukrainian Elina Svitolina.

Halep entered Wednesday’s quarterfinal having not lost a set all tournament long, but quickly fell behind 5-0 in the opener, before losing the set 6-3. The fifth-seed and 2014 finalist then fell behind 1-5 in the second set.

After trimming the deficit to 2-5, Halep said:

“I just sat down at 5-2, and I sad that the match is lost. That’s it. It’s over. And then I started to feel more relaxed—maybe because I thought it was finished—and it came.”

And it came quickly. Halep rattled off the next five games to take a 6-5 lead, and Svitolina had to save four set points to force the frame into a tiebreaker. Svitolina set up match point, but Halep saved it, and a net cord winner gave Halep the set and the momentum.

She played flawless tennis in the third set, breaking in the opening game and never looked back, handing Svitolina a third-set bagel, committing just one unforced error in the process.

“I just tried to make her move more, to open [up] the court, and it came. I don’t know how, but it was really good,” said Halep. “But I believed that it was gonna come; it’s gonna turn something around, and that’s it. I’m just happy. I am not thinking about how it was. I just take the fight thing,that I was fighting till the end.”

Halep moves on to play second-seed Karolina Pliskova, who ended the dream run of France’s Caroline Garcia with a 7-6(3), 6-4 win on Wednesday.

“Before this tournament I was struggling on clay with almost everything,” Pliskova said afterwards. “I didn’t have my weapons on my side and the movement was terrible. I don’t think it’s better [now], but somehow I’m just winning. Today I can finally say I felt a little bit better on the court compared to the last matches.”

The other women’s singles semifinal will see Latvian teenager Jelena Ostapenko take on Switzerland’s Timea Bacsinszky. 


New York Tennis Magazine Staff
Centercourt
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