After letting another big lead slip with an error-strewn performance at the French Open on Wednesday, top-ranked Aryna Sabalenka felt like getting as far away from the courts as possible.
“Just want to quit tennis right now,” Sabalenka said after wasting a lead of a set and two breaks in a 3-6, 7-5, 6-0 loss to Diana Shnaider in the women’s singles quarter-finals. “We’ll see in few days. Hopefully I’ll get back on track mentally.”
Sabalenka’s wait for a first French Open title continues despite the four-time major winner leading 4-1 in the second set and being two points from victory while serving for the match at 5-4. What followed was a complete collapse as she lost 12 of the final 13 games against a player appearing in her first Grand Slam quarter-final, looking increasingly frustrated and forlorn in the windy conditions.
Photo: AP
Just like her loss to Coco Gauff in last year’s final, when she also won the first set before a slew of unforced errors, this one will take some time to get over.
“You know those rooms where you just go in and you smash everything,” Sabalenka said. “Probably I will spend a whole day tomorrow over there destroying stuff. Maybe it will help, maybe not.”
“I screw up, and then she [Shnaider] stepped in and she played great. I feel like mentally I couldn’t really recover after the second set,” Sabalenka said. “I don’t know when was the last time that happened to me that I lost 10 games in a row. I don’t know. I guess mentally I got into very deep, deep, dark hole over there, and I just couldn’t get back mentally on track.”
Photo: AP
Shnaider’s best previous performance in a major was a fourth-round run at the US Open in 2024. She was to play the second semi-final against Maja Chwalinska.
The first semi-final was to be played between Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk and Mirra Andreeva of Russia.
Both matches were to finish after press time last night
Photo: EPA
Chwalinska earlier on Wednesday extended her remarkable Roland Garros run by beating No. 22-seeded Anna Kalinskaya 7-6 (3), 6-3.
Chwalinska of Poland became just the second women’s qualifier to reach the last four at Roland Garros in the professional era.
“I honestly don’t know what’s going on. I know I repeat myself, but every single match here is kind of crazy for me so I’m very grateful,” Chwalinska said on court.
Photo: AFP
It was her eighth win at the tournament after she battled through three qualifying rounds to reach the main draw of a major for just the third time in her career.
Prior to her run in Paris, Chwalinska had only ever won two tour-level matches on clay in her career, now she stands one victory away from competing for the biggest title the surface has to offer.
“I feel like I just, for some reason, I don’t process it, you know, but definitely after the tournament finishes, I will kind of have time to, I guess, be grateful for what happened and process it as well,” Chwalinska said.
Photo: AFP
In the men’s singles, Sunday’s final is guaranteed to have an Italian after Flavio Cobolli came back from a set down to edge Canada’s Felix Auger-Aliassime 4-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4.
“I felt like this is the chance of my life,” the 10th seed said. “I have to give everything in my matches and today I did that so I’m really happy.”
At the start of the tournament, it seemed almost a given that an Italian would make it to the title-match, with top seed Jannik Sinner on a scintillating clay-court run.
However, the Italian world No. 1 lost in the second round and blew the top half of the draw wide open.
His compatriots have stepped into the chasm left by Sinner’s exit. Cobolli faces fellow first-time Grand Slam semi-finalist Matteo Arnaldi in the semi-finals today after Arnaldi progressed past the injured Matteo Berrettini in the night session.
The 104th-ranked Arnaldi was leading 7-5, 5-2 when 2021 Wimbledon runner-up Berrettini was forced to retire with a hip injury.
“You never want someone to end the tournament like this,” Arnaldi said of his injury-plagued countryman. It is “unbelievable, I still can’t believe if I think where I was one month ago, I was nearly 150 in the world.”
Second-seeded Alexander Zverev of Germany and No. 26 Jakub Mensik of the Czech Republic are to meet in the other semi-final.
In the women’s doubles, Taiwan’s Liang En-shuo advanced to the semi-finals.
Liang and Shuko Aoyama of Japan booked a place in today’s match by defeating France’s Kristina Mladenovic and Guo Hanyu of China 6-4, 6-4.
They face Serbia’s Aleksandra Krunic and Anna Danilina of Kazakhstan for a place in the final.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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