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ROLAND GARROS 2014 - THURSDAY 5 JUNE IP: 46.255.183.159 Posted on June 5, 2014 at 10:51:27 PM by David Barnes
ROLAND GARROS 2014
THURSDAY 5 JUNE (DAY 12)
Both women’s semi-finals were intriguing match-ups, with only two top 10 seeds, namely Simona Halep and Maria Sharapova, at 4 and 7 respectively, remaining in the mix. Sharapova took on the ‘discovery’ of 2013/14, Australian Open semi-finalist earlier this year, 18th seed Eugenie Bouchard, who put out two higher ranking seeds, Angelique Kerber and Carla Suarez Navarro in her two previous rounds here, while Halep faced Andrea Petkovic, the no. 28 seed, both of them Grand Slam semi-final debutantes.
The key to the Sharapova/Bouchard match was the ability or otherwise of the Canadian girl to start quickly and efficiently, not allow nerves to get the better of her, and finish in the same vein. Bouchard broke Sharapova in the latter’s second service game and despite being broken herself at 4-3, broke back immediately to take a 5-4 lead, sealing the set 6-4 on her next serve, in 44 minutes, when the Russian sent an anguished backhand return into the tramlines.
The 2nd set followed a familiar pattern for Sharapova, with the eventual triumph of experience over hope, on her fifth set point, 7-5, after more twists and turns than are usual in a game of snakes and ladders; it had taken 59 minutes and had been anything but easy, with six double faults from Sharapova’s racket contributing to a random performance that moved from the mediocre to the excellent with hesitant difficulty.
The third set started with some electric passages of shot-making, each player producing moments of ethereal yet studied brilliance. Bouchard’s first name is often shortened to ‘Genie’, which in French means ‘genius’, and was temporarily apt, as she kept pace with her opponent until a poor service game conceded a 3-1 lead. The Russian then piled on the pressure, Bouchard made a series of costly mistakes, and was broken again when she pushed a forehand wide to go 2-4 down. At 2-5, after a Sharapova service hold, the Canadian saved four match points but the fifth proved one too many, the Russian plonking a scorching forehand onto the baseline for a hard-won victory, 4-6, 7-5, 6-2, in a shade under two and a half hours, and her 19th consecutive three-set win on clay since 2010.
Sharapova admitted afterwards that it had been an especially close-run three-set affair this time; “My opponent played extremely well, exceptional tennis and I didn't feel I was playing my best. I fought, I scrambled, and I found a way to win. I'm happy and proud about that”.
Most of the crowd left for a breather immediately afterwards, and those who were slow to return missed Simona Halep, the favourite, take the first set 6-2 in a brisk, business-like 28 minutes. The second was more problematical, as the shadows lengthened across the court and the number of unforced errors from both players increased. Halep led 4-2 in the tie-break at the change of ends, held her nerve, if not her serve, with a glaring drop-shot miss and a backhand sprayed wide compounding the German’s misery, so that the Romanian girl made it through, 6-2, 7-6(4) to face the current doyenne de la terre battue on Saturday.
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David Barnes/Topspin, 2014
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