French Open: Double surprise in women’s singles! Rybakina and Sabalenka both quit in France. Andreeva and Paolini will play for the final

The Roland Garros quarterfinals are history. No surprises in Tuesday’s women’s singles matches. But Wednesday’s matches have! First, Kazakhstan’s Elena Rybakina lost to Italy’s Paolini in three sets. Then, after a great turnaround, the talented Russian Andreeva eliminated the world number two. Aryna Sabalenka won’t even make the final this year.

Paolini – Rybakina: 6:2, 4:6, 6:4

The Italian did very well from the beginning of the match. She managed to break the favourite in the first game, which she repeated in the seventh game and won the first set quite clearly. In the second set, the Italian also did very well. She led 4:3 and served, but she didn’t manage the last three games and the Kazakh took the second set.

The third set was in the spirit of winning breaks, with the decisive one eventually going to the twenty-eight-year-old Italian and she could celebrate her advancement to the next round.

For the first time in her career, Jasmine Paolini will play a singles semifinal at a Grand Slam. Her best result to date was a 4th round finish at the Australian open. At Roland Garros, her furthest reach was the second round. This year has been a breakthrough year. Paolini reached the semifinals and it may not be the final for her. On Thursday, she’ll challenge the other surprise of the tournament, Russia’s Andreeva.

Andreeva – Sabalenka: 6:7, 6:4, 6:4

The Belarusian tennis player was counted on much higher at the beginning of the tournament. Fans were already looking for another final between the world number one and number two. However, everything was spoiled by Mirra Andreeva, only 17 years old, who has been performing very well in this tournament. She has lost only two sets at the French Open so far and will go into the semi-finals as a slight favourite.

The first set was full of twists and turns and lost serves, which finally had to be decided by a tiebreak in which the favourite Sabalenka was more successful. However, even that was not enough to win the match and the young Russian managed to turn the match around. For Andreeva, this is also her best Grand Slam result to date, and she will be looking to improve on it.

The match is scheduled for Thursday at 16:30. The winner of this semifinal will go to the better of the Swiatek/Gauff pairing.

Sources: WTA, French Open