Chan Hao-ching on Friday advanced to her second final at Wimbledon, but it was not plain sailing for the Taiwanese as she and partner Monica Niculescu took three minutes short of three hours to see off the challenge of Makoto Ninomiya and Renata Voracova in their women’s doubles semi-final.
The ninth-seeded Taiwanese-Romanian duo eventually edged the Japanese-Czech pairing 7-6 (7/4), 4-6, 9-7 on Court 1 at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club in southwest London.
Chan had to call for medical treatment to her shoulder and back in the latter stages of the final set, but the Taiwanese held her nerve and delivered enough power to get the ninth seeds over the line.
Photo: CNA
Chan and Niculescu saved two of six break points and converted four of 18, winning 141 of the 275 points contested to advance to a final against Russian second seeds Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina, who defeated 12th seeds Anna-Lena Groenefeld of Germany and Kveta Peschke of the Czech Republic 7-5, 6-2 in the earlier semi-final on Court 1.
It was to be Chan’s second appearance in a final at the third Grand Slam of the season after she finished runner-up in the mixed doubles alongside Max Mirnyi of Belarus at Wimbledon in 2014.
The Russians finished runners-up in the women’s doubles in 2015 when they lost the final to Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza.
Photo: AFP
In the men’s singles, much has changed for Roger Federer since he played in — and won — his first Grand Slam final at Wimbledon in 2003.
First of all, as he reminded everyone after moving into his 11th title match at the All England Club — with a shot at his eighth championship, more than any man in history — he favored a ponytail and some scruff on his cheeks way back then.
Nowadays, his hair is short, his face clean shaven.
Another significant difference for Federer — whose 36th birthday is on Aug. 8, making him the oldest men’s finalist at Wimbledon since 1974 — is family.
“I didn’t have kids running around, potentially waking me up at night,” he said. “Today we’ve got to, like, close down the doors. Say: ‘Daddy is sleeping.’”
He is a father of four: twin boys, aged eight; twin girls, nearly eight.
On the court, there are ways in which the Federer who faces Marin Cilic today is not the same as the Federer who beat Mark Philippoussis 14 years ago. The larger racket, for example, or the increased willingness to hit over the top on his backhand.
In truth, though, what is most important is that Federer is still as capable as ever of beating everyone who stands in his way.
“This guy doesn’t really seem [to be] getting any older or anything like that, or slowing down at all,” said Tomas Berdych, who lost to Federer in the semi-finals.
Former European champions Celtic exited the UEFA Champions League in the qualifiers after a 3-2 penalty shoot-out defeat at Kazakhstan’s Kairat Almaty on Tuesday, following two goalless legs in the playoff tie. Kairat are to compete in the competition proper for the first time, while Norway’s Bodo/Glimt and Cyprus’s Pafos also secured debut appearances after coming through the playoffs. Celtic’s night ended in disappointment as they missed three penalties in the shoot-out, Daizen Maeda failing with the decisive spot-kick. The slugfest of a match went into extra-time with neither side finding the net and few overall chances, echoing the first
Rangers on Wednesday bowed out of the UEFA Champions League playoffs with a humiliating 6-0 defeat at the hands of Club Brugge which piles further pressure on head coach Russell Martin, while SL Benfica secured a place in the competition proper at the expense of Jose Mourinho’s Fenerbahce. The Glasgow giants traveled to Belgium right up against it after losing 3-1 at home in last week’s first leg, when they conceded three times in the opening 20 minutes. They never looked like turning the tie around as Club Brugge took the lead inside five minutes at the Jan Breydelstadion through Nicolo Tresoldi
Australian Alex de Minaur reached the second week of the US Open for the third year in a row with little fanfare on Saturday and said he intended to keep winning until the tournament organizers were forced to give him better billing. Despite being the eighth seed and a quarter-finalist last year at Flushing Meadows, De Minaur’s third-round match against German Daniel Altmaier was scheduled for Court 17 — the smallest of the four stadium venues in the precinct. “It is a little bit of a headscratcher for me. I’m not gonna lie,” he told reporters after progressing 6-7 (9/7), 6-3, 6-4,
Noah Lyles on Thursday warmed up for the upcoming athletics world championships by chasing down Olympic champion Letsile Tebogo to win the 200m at the Diamond League final. Lyles trailed Tebogo at the start, but gradually erased the deficit over the final 100m and pipped the Botswana sprinter to the line by centimeters. Lyles, the Olympic 100m champion and reigning world champion in both the 100m and 200m, clocked 19.74 seconds in a slight headwind. Tebogo was 0.02 seconds behind. It was Lyles’ sixth Diamond League title, a record for track athletes. “Six, that’s a big number,” Lyles said. “Shoot, that’s another record on
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