Sixth seed Samantha Stosur stormed into her third semifinal at Roland Garros and her opponent will be Sara Errani, a first-time Grand Slam semifinalist, against whom she has a 5-0 head-to-head record, including this year’s defeat of the Italian in the second round on the clay of Rome.
In the quarterfinals, the 2010 runner-up Stosur took out Dominika Cibulkova, world No.1 Victoria Azarenka’s conqueror, 6-4 6-1. The 15th-seeded Cibulkova converted only one of ten break point opportunities, and that one helped her approach Stosur, from being 5-2 down in the first set, Cibulkova moved to 5-4, but she didn’t converted her break chances to level to 5-5. Stosur then won the first set and 31 minutes later the whole match. The Australian is yet to lose a set this year at the French Open.
After eliminating former Roland Garros champions Svetlana Kuznetsova and Ana Ivanovic, seed No.21 Errani recorded her first victory over a Top 10 player in 29 matches, by beating world No.10 Angelique Kerber 6-3 7-6(2) in the quarterfinals. There were eighth breaks of serve in the second set and Germany’s Kerber had two chances to serve out the set but was broken and Errani eventually won in a tiebreak.
Errani’s career record against Stosur might look discouraging, but we can expect nothing short of an interesting semifinal, especially given that Errani has won three successive titles on clay this season. The two remaining quarterfinals will be played tomorrow: Yaroslava Shvedova vs. Petra Kvitova and Kaia Kanepi vs. Maria Sharapova. (photos: sr_cranks)
There was actually a rather fascinating short period in the match, when Cibulkova seemed to be about to turn it around with her bullying ways, only to be stopped in her tracks by Samantha’s (the one with an “awkward contrast feature in the middle [of her dress]”) shifting into an angry mode of “enough of this nonsense, I won’t be denied by the lesser player’s antics”. If only she can hold to this mode from now on…
Bullying ways? At least she doesnt yell at every point like Sharapova or Azarenka. She was just trying to stay energised. And I dont agree she is a lesser player. Its quite possible that she will get to top 10 this year as she has found a way of beating top players.
Yes, letting out a triumphant warrior’s cry at the top of one’s voice after literally every single point won (including those won by the opponent’s unforced errors!) is pure bullying. And to say that at least she doesn’t yell at every [stroke] like some others do is tantamount to saying “well, this guy is manhandling people, but at least he doesn’t maul them like that one.” Gamesmanship has many forms, all of them bad and ugly.