The biggest result at the French Open on Friday was Jessica Pegula’s third-round upset. Elise Mertens, seeded 28th, upset the third-seeded American 6-1, 6-3 in an hour and 22 minutes.
Pegula had made easy work of her opponent in the two opening rounds but she found it difficult to do the same against the Belgian. It also didn’t help Pegula’s case that Mertens had a 2-0 win-to-loss record against the 29-year-old prior to this match. The player ranked in the top-10 of the WTA rankings struggled with her shot-making all throughout the match. A fightback from Pegula did come at length in the eighth game of the second set when she had a couple of break-back points to level the set at four-all. But Mertens fended them all off before securing the match on her serve in the ninth game.
Mertens converted all five break points that came her way and saved five of the six break points she faced. Pegula had 19 winners to Mertens’ 20 and 28 unforced errors to the latter’s 13.
This will be the third time Mertens will be playing in the fourth round in Paris. It’s also the second straight season she’s advanced to the fourth round of this particular Major as well. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova will be her next rival.
French Open: Elina Svitolina, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova impressThe 2021 runner-up to Barbora Krejcikova’s winner in the city, Pavlyuchenkova’s posted an emphatic 4-6, 6-3, 6-0 win over Anastasia Potapova. Pavlyuchenkova completed the match in nine minutes shy of two hours.
Potapova’s level dropped from the first set to the third set. In the opener, she won 74% of her first-serve points. In the second, this fell to 53% and in the third, she won only 20% (one of five points played) of her first-serve points. Pavlyuchenkova won 53% of her first-serve points across the first and second sets but this number went up to 75% in the decider. Apart from winning more first-serve returns, the 31-year-old also won eight of 10 points on return on Potapova’s second serve to make it through to the fourth round for the first time since 2021. Last year, the former world no. 11 had to miss the event due to severe injury.
Second seed Aryna Sabalenka also posted an incredible result for herself at the French Open. The world no. 2 reached the second week at Roland Garros for the first time after securing a 6-2, 6-2 win over Kamilla Rakhimova.
Lastly, Elina Svitolina and Daria Kasatkina have set up a fourth-round clash against each other at the French Open. Svitolina won her Strasbourg International finale rematch against Anna Blinkova. This time though, the Ukrainian needed three sets to overpower Blinkova. The 28-year-old won 2-6, 6-2, 7-5. The ninth-seeded Kasatkina was the first to make it to week two in Paris with a 6-0, 6-1 triumph over Peyton Stearns in 55 minutes.
Photo Credit: Elise Mertens Twitter
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