Sloane Stephens vs Daria Kasatkina French Open 2018 Preview and Prediction
Sloane Stephens is perfectly placed for a second grand slam final in three tournaments going into Tuesday’s play.…
Sloane Stephens is perfectly placed for a second grand slam final in three tournaments going into Tuesday’s play.…
Novak Djokovic is a heavy favourite to be back in the semi-finals of a grand slam for the first time since the US Open in 2016.…
French Open 2018 |
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Venue: Roland Garros, Paris Dates: 27 May-10 June |
Coverage: Daily live radio and text commentaries on BBC Radio 5 live, the BBC Sport website and app. |
Ten-time French Open champion Rafael Nadal moved into the 2018 quarter-finals with a 6-3 6-2 7-6 (7-4) victory over Germany’s Maximilian Marterer.
Nadal, 32, lost his opening service game and trailed 2-0 in the first set in Paris before recovering well.
He broke Marterer’s serve early in the second set and fought back from 3-1 down in the third for a straight-set win against the unseeded 22-year-old.
The Spaniard will play 11th seed Diego Schwartzman, 25, in the last eight.
The Argentine recovered from two sets down to beat South African sixth seed Kevin Anderson 1-6 2-6 7-5 7-6 (7-0) 6-2 to move into the second Grand Slam quarter-final of his career – and first at Roland Garros.
Nadal, meanwhile, has reached at least the quarter-finals in 12 of the 14 years he has played in the French Open.
The world number one has won 37 consecutive sets in the tournament, though he needed a tie-break in the third set to secure Monday’s win over world number 70 Marterer.
Nadal, who celebrated his birthday on Sunday, is now third on the all-time list for most match wins at Grand Slams, moving clear of Jimmy Connors with his 234th.
“I don’t feel old, but I am 32, and I have been here since 2003, so it’s a long way, a lot of years,” said Nadal.
“I started very young. That’s a real thing. But, no, I feel happy to be here. I hope to keep doing this for a while.”
Schwartzman, who is 5ft 7in, said his victory over 6ft 8in Anderson was like “David and Goliath”.
“I read it when I was young in school, and I just try to think that when I see Kevin or the guys who are two metres (tall),” he said.
“When you’re not as strong or you’re not as tall as Anderson, you can still win the match. I think people like me more, as well, for that, because they were supporting me.
“They wanted me to remain in the game and the fact he was twice as tall as me was a reason for me to try and remain. But you can have a very good serve whether you’re tall or small. That didn’t have anything to do with it.”
Nadal, who has won all his five previous meetings with Schwartzman, said of the Argentine: “It’s always good to see him in the quarter-final because he’s a good friend, a good person.
“He’s a worker, and I’m happy to see him having all this success. Hopefully not too much.”
Schwartzman’s compatriot Juan Martin del Potro also moved into the last eight with a 6-4 6-4 6-4 win over American ninth seed John Isner.
Del Potro, seeded fifth, faces either third seed Marin Cilic of Croatia or Italian 18th seed Fabio Fognini in the quarter-finals.
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French Open 2018 |
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Venue: Roland Garros, Paris Dates: 27 May-10 June |
Coverage: Daily live radio and text commentaries on BBC Radio 5 live, the BBC Sport website and app. |
Serena Williams pulled out of the French Open before her fourth-round match with Maria Sharapova because of an injury that affected her serve.
The 23-time Grand Slam winner recently returned to tennis after giving birth to her first child, but looked in good form in her opening matches.
“I’ve had issues with the right pectoral muscle to the point where I can’t serve,” said the 36-year-old.
“I’ll have a scan. I won’t know about Wimbledon until I get the results.”
Williams said she first felt the problem during her third-round win over German 11th seed Julia Gorges on Saturday.
She played in a doubles match with sister Venus on Sunday, saying she wanted to try to manage the problem before her match with Sharapova.
“I tried lots of taping and support to see how it felt in match circumstances,” Williams said.
“It is hard to play when I can’t physically serve. I’ve never had this injury before, I’ve never felt it in my life and it was so painful.
“I don’t know how to manage it.”
Williams said she will have an MRI scan in Paris on Tuesday and will stay in the French capital at least until the extent of her injury is clear.
Sharapova said she was “looking forward” to playing Williams and “disappointed” the American had to withdraw.
“I wish her a speedy recovery and hope she returns to the tour soon,” she added.
The 31-year-old Russian, a two-time winner at Roland Garros, will play 2016 champion Garbine Muguruza. The Spaniard was 2-0 up in the opening set of her match against Lesia Tsurenko when the Ukrainian retired hurt.
The possibility of Williams facing Sharapova had been grabbing attention since the draw was made at Roland Garros 10 days ago.
And the meeting of the two former champions, both making comebacks at Roland Garros this year, was set up when Williams beat Gorges shortly after Sharapova beat Czech sixth seed Karolina Pliskova.
Williams has recently returned after giving birth to daughter Olympia in September, while 28th seed Sharapova is back in the draw after being refused a wildcard last year as she returned from a 15-month drugs ban.
The pair have had a frosty relationship since they first met on court in 2003, although Williams said in her pre-match news conference on Saturday that she did not have any “negative feelings” towards the Russian.
There has not been much of a rivalry on court in recent years, Williams having won 19 of their 21 meetings. Both of Sharapova’s wins came in 2004 – including that year’s Wimbledon final.
Tennis correspondent Russell Fuller at Roland Garros
Williams had been in astoundingly good form in the first week, but footage of the final set of Sunday’s doubles – which she and sister Venus lost 6-0 – showed Serena rolling in a number of slow first serves.
The three-time champion chose to play doubles as well as singles because she knew she needed matches under her belt. But six matches in six days – after just four in the previous 16 months – appears to have taken its toll. A pectoral injury is most commonly associated with overuse.
Tuesday’s MRI scan will reveal more, but if there is no serious damage, then Wimbledon may still be very much within Williams’ sights. There are still four weeks to go, and not being able to play a grass-court warm-up event beforehand should not be a concern: only twice in her career has she done so.
Feliciano Lopez and Marc Lopez saved one match point to book their place in the Roland Garros semi-finals on Monday, defeating third seeds Henri Kontinen and John Peers 6-4, 6-7(2), 7-6(3).
The 2016 champions moved one step away from their second final in three years at the clay-court Grand Slam championship, saving match point at 4-5 (30/40) in the deciding set before breaking serve and securing victory after two hours and 21 minutes.
The Spaniards, who won their third team title at the Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell in April, led by a set and a double break before the Nitto ATP Finals champions rallied to force a decider. Kontinen and Peers broke first, but the No. 12 seeds held their nerve, breaking back in the 10th game to extend the match before clinching victory on their first match point in the third-set tie-break.
Lopez/Lopez won 70 per cent of first-serve points throughout the last-eight contest and converted four of nine break points en route to victory. They will meet fifth seeds Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah or ATP Doubles Race To London leaders Oliver Marach and Mate Pavic for a place in the final.
Did You Know?
Feliciano Lopez and Marc Lopez are bidding to become the first Spanish duo in the Open Era to win multiple titles at Roland Garros. In 2016, they became just the second all-Spanish team to lift the trophy in the Open Era, following in the footsteps of 1990 champions Sergio Casal and Emilio Sanchez. Sanchez did win two doubles titles at the event, but his first triumph in 1988 came alongside Ecuador’s Andres Gomez.
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French Open 2018 |
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Venue: Roland Garros, Paris Dates: 27 May-10 June |
Coverage: Daily live radio and text commentaries on BBC Radio 5 live sports extra, the BBC Sport website and app. |
Australian Open champion and second seed Caroline Wozniacki is out of the French Open, beaten 7-6 (7-5) 6-3 by Daria Kasatkina in the last 16.
Russia’s Kasatkina, 21, raced away with the last three games of a match that had been halted at 3-3 in the second set on Sunday because of bad light.
The 14th seed will face American 10th seed Sloane Stephens in the last eight.
World number one Simona Halep, runner-up in 2014 and 2017, beat 16th seed Elise Mertens of Belgium 6-2 6-1.
The Romanian, 26, broke her opponent’s serve six times as she won in 59 minutes, with the second set taking just 22 minutes.
“I was a bit nervous at the start of the match but I played my best match here at Roland Garros,” said Halep.
“I need to be more aggressive and try to finish the points because I don’t hit so many winners.”
Halep will take on either seventh seed Caroline Garcia of France or German 12th seed Angelique Kerber in the last eight.
Serena Williams will play Maria Sharapova for the first time in nearly 2 years on Monday afternoon, weather permitting.…
Britain’s Andy Murray is still aiming to be fit for the grass-court season and will make a statement this week, says his mother Judy.
The Scot, who has not played competitively since Wimbledon last year, had a hip operation in January.
Murray, 31, has won Wimbledon twice and this year’s tournament starts on 2 July.
“He’s doing the rehabilitation. He’s been back on the court in the last couple of days,” Judy told BBC Sport.
“His goal was always to try and be ready for the grass-court season and that is still his goal, so fingers crossed.”
The next event the former world number one could play in is the grass-court Libema Open in Rosmalen, the Netherlands, from 11 to 17 June.
But former Fed Cup captain Judy says her son – now the British number two behind Kyle Edmund – will not risk playing at Wimbledon if he is not ready.
“Any player who has been out injured, it takes you a bit of time to get back to top form,” she said.
“When he had his back surgery in 2013 he was back playing within three months, but it took him the best part of a year to get back to his top form.
“You need matches to build up your match fitness. You are not going to come back and start where you left off.
“He will be guided by his body and how he feels. He is the only person who knows how he feels.
“The most important thing is he gets fit again for the long term and any top athlete would tell you they would not come back until they felt they could give 100%, especially in a major like Wimbledon.”
Murray missed the first six months of the 2004 season because of a knee injury and had surgery two months after his first Wimbledon title in 2013 because of a problem with his lower back.
“He is not a stranger to rehabilitation and this one has taken longer than anyone probably expected and certainly longer than he would have liked,” said Judy.
“It has been incredibly frustrating for him and his team and you have to develop resilience. Fortunately he is very resilient, always working really hard and doing what he has to do.
“He knows what he still wants to achieve in the game. He is getting closer to where he wants to be and you will all hear from him in the next couple of days.”
A LOOK BACK
Internazionali di Tennis Citta’ di Vicenza (Vicenza, Italy): The hottest player on the ATP Challenger Tour continued his dominant run of form. Hugo Dellien notched a tour-leading third crown of the year with a 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 victory over Matteo Donati in Sunday’s Vicenza final.
With the partisan Italian crowd firmly in his opponent’s favour in both the semi-finals and final, Dellien earned new fans with his impressive performances. Wins over home hopes Gian Marco Moroni on Saturday and Donati on Sunday vaulted the Bolivian to the winners’ circle at the Tennis Palladio 98.
It has been a rapid rise for the 24-year-old, with all of his three titles – on the green clay of Sarasota and Savannah and red dirt of Vicenza – coming in the past seven weeks. In fact, Dellien has posted an 18-1 record in that span, with his only Challenger defeat to Noah Rubin in the Tallahassee semi-finals.
Dellien, whose triumph in Sarasota made him the first Bolivian winner on the circuit in 35 years, will get a significant boost in his Top 100 pursuit. Having entered the month of April at No. 259 in the ATP Rankings, he is projected to surpass his career-high of No. 129 one week from Monday.
Dellien will look to continue his strong form as he shifts to the clay of Shymkent, Kazakhstan for the $50,000 event. He is seeded second at the tournament, which is in its second edition. Last year’s runner-up Yannick Hanfmann leads the field.
What a run for @hugo_dellien, champion in Vicenza!
✅ Third title in past four #ATPChallenger events
✅ 18-1 since mid-April
✅ Closing in on the Top 100 pic.twitter.com/uglOBrEKil— ATP Challenger Tour (@ATPChallenger) June 3, 2018
A LOOK AHEAD
The grass season has arrived! The three-week swing kicks off in the London suburb of Surbiton for the 15th edition of the Fuzion 100 Surbiton Trophy. Jeremy Chardy, Alex de Minaur, Jordan Thompson and Yuki Bhambri lead the singles draw, with former World No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt teaming with Alex Bolt in doubles. Nick Kyrgios is also competing in the doubles competition, alongside Jackson Withrow.
The Moneta Czech Open, a €127,000 event in Prostejov, celebrates its 25th anniversary this week. Guillermo Garcia Lopez is the top seed, with Pablo Cuevas seeded second and home hope Jiri Vesely a three-time champion. Vesely has won three of the past four editions (2014-15 & ’17).
In Poznan, Poland, Alexey Vatutin looks to defend his title. He is joined by an impressive field that includes Taro Daniel, Miomir Kecmanovic, Martin Klizan and Victor Estrella Burgos.