Rybakina to face Paolini
No.4 seed Elena Rybakina booked her place in her second Roland Garros quarterfinal with a 6-4, 6-3 defeat of No.15 seed Elina Svitolina in 69 minutes. She will face No.12 seed Jasmine Paolini, who reached the last eight of a Grand Slam for the first time with a 4-6, 6-0, 6-1 win over Elina Avanesyan.
Rybakina, who reached the first Grand Slam quarterfinal of her career at Roland Garros 2021, advances to the last eight of a major for the fifth time overall, and for the first time since Wimbledon last year. The Kazakhstani player has not dropped a set in the tournament so far.
The result moves Rybakina into a tour-leading ninth quarterfinal of 2024. She has won three Hologic WTA Tour titles so far this season, in Brisbane, Abu Dhabi and Stuttgart, and her overall record is now 34-5.
The last time the pair had met was in the bronze medal play-off at the Tokyo Olympic Games in 2021, with Svitolina edging that match 1-6, 7-6(5), 6-4. The Ukrainian had also won their only previous clay-court encounter 6-4, 1-6, 6-2 in the 2020 Strasbourg final. Rybakina, who previously defeated Svitolina at Eastbourne 2021, levels their head-to-head at two wins apiece.
How the match was won: Both sets followed similar trajectories: Rybakina leapt out to an early lead, Svitolina pegged her back but Rybakina pulled away again to close.
As usual, Rybakina's ball-striking off the ground and strong serve were the bedrock of her win: she tallied 26 winners, including five aces. But the variety she has incorporated into her game enabled her to find an extra gear when she needed it. Early on, Rybakina repeatedly deployed the drop shot, testing Svitolina's movement to successful effect.
In the second, the former Wimbledon champion pressed home her advantage at net, where she won 12 out of 18 points overall.
"I'm trying to come to the net more often," she said afterwards. "Of course I think that's the one thing if I improve it's going to be easier maybe to close some rallies. But it depends, of course, on the score, if you're confident to do that or not. But slowly I think I'm doing good to progress in that."
After breaking Svitolina in the first game, Rybakina relinquished her lead with a flurry of unforced errors. However, she regained the break with a booming backhand winner for 3-2, and saved the only further break point she faced in the set in similar style.
Rybakina made a dominant start to the second set, building a 4-1 double break lead. This time, Svitolina found her best shots of the match -- including a terrific backhand pass -- to get one of the breaks back, but was unable to reel Rybakina in any further.
Paolini notches another milestone: At the age of 28, Paolini is enjoying a career-best season. In 2023, she received a nomination for Most Improved Player in the year-end WTA Awards after breaking into the Top 30, and the Italian has built on that in style. In January, she reached the fourth round of a major for the first time at the Australian Open; she followed it with a maiden WTA 1000 trophy in Dubai in February.
A Grand Slam quarterfinal debut was on the line for both Paolini and Avanesyan, but it was the former who also had the pressure of being the favorite by ranking to win. For the first four games of the match, she struggled to impose herself, getting dragged into Avanesyan's favored style of looping topspin exchanges and leaking errors as a result.
Down 4-0, Paolini began stepping inside the court and unleashing her power earlier in rallies, a strategy that would prove to be a winning one. It wasn't enough to save the first set, which Avanesyan served out at the second opportunity, but Paolini was in total control over the next two. She fired 20 of her 29 total winners in the second and third sets, and ultimately won 16 of the last 19 games of the match.
"I was a little bit, let's say, outside of the match," said Paolini in her on-court interview. "So I tried to do one game, then two, three, to get back into the match. To have a better sensation on my racquet. I think it went well, and the second set I was already in the match."
Praised by Mats Wilander for the heart she showed in pulling off the comeback, the 5'4" Paolini laughed as she replied:
"It has to be big because I'm so small!"
Rybakina leads the head-to-head with Paolini 2-1, including a 6-3, 5-7, 6-3 victory in the Stuttgart quarterfinals in April. Paolini's win came via retirement in last year's Cincinnati third round.
Sabalenka to face Andreeva
No.2 seed Aryna Sabalenka and fast-rising teenager Mirra Andreeva will face off in the Roland Garros quarterfinals after straight-sets victories in the Round of 16 on Monday.
Sabalenka reached the Roland Garros quarterfinals for the second straight year with a 6-2, 6-3 victory over No.22 seed Emma Navarro on Court Philippe Chatrier on Monday.
Sabalenka, a semifinalist in her career-best Paris showing last year, needed just 69 minutes to dismiss up-and-coming American Navarro and make her ninth career Grand Slam quarterfinal. Sabalenka avenged a loss to Navarro from earlier this year in Indian Wells.
On Court Suzanne Lenglen, 17-year-old Andreeva reached the first Grand Slam quarterfinal of her burgeoning career with a 7-5, 6-2 win over the last remaining French player, Varvara Gracheva.
Andreeva, one of the highest-ranked unseeded players at World No.38 and last season's WTA Newcomer of the Year, saved two set points at 5-4 in the first set. Andreeva then dominated proceedings from there to end Gracheva's run.
Sabalenka has beaten Andreeva twice, both times in straight sets on the clay of Madrid in 2023 and 2024.
Big events, best results: Sabalenka has been extremely reliable at the Grand Slam events of late. Coming into this event, she has made the semifinals or better in her last six Grand Slam appearances, including titles at the last two Australian Opens.
"It sounds crazy to me, to be honest, and I'm super happy that I was able to bring this consistency on the Grand Slams," Sabalenka said about her Grand Slam surge. "It's motivating me a lot to keep pushing myself a lot and to see where is the limit."
The 26-year-old Sabalenka still has a chance to win the Australian Open and Roland Garros titles in the same year, thereby completing the first half of the calendar year Grand Slam. The last woman to do that was Serena Williams in 2015.
Sabalenka's results this fortnight, and indeed in this clay-court season, make this a distinct possibility. Sabalenka has lost only 17 games in her four matches in Paris, and she is undefeated on clay this year against players ranked outside the Top 10.
In Sabalenka's last two clay-court events, only World No.1 Iga Swiatek could stop her, in the Madrid and Rome finals. Sabalenka even had match points to win her third straight Madrid title before Swiatek squeaked out that win.
Tale of the tape: Sabalenka's latest victory started with a quick opening set against 23-year-old Navarro, who was playing in her first Grand Slam Round of 16 in the midst of a breakthrough season. Sabalenka lost only one point behind her first serve in the first set.
In the second set, Sabalenka slammed a backhand return winner to break Navarro at love for 2-1. Navarro finally got to deuce on Sabalenka's serve in the following game, but Sabalenka got out of that jam with typically well-timed power -- two straight aces.
Navarro successfully fended off break points in her next two service games, but not at 5-3, where Sabalenka fired a forehand winner to convert her first match point. Sabalenka had 36 winners to Navarro's 15 in the match.
Andreeva breaks through: Meanwhile, Andreeva finds herself in the new territory of a Grand Slam quarterfinal. She is just the third player in the last 18 years to make a Roland Garros quarterfinal before turning 18, joining Amanda Anisimova in 2019 and Coco Gauff in 2021.
Andreeva had already been knocking on that door, as this was the third time in the last four Grand Slam events she had made it into the Round of 16. She shattered that ceiling with her 91-minute win over 88th-ranked Gracheva, who was playing in her first Grand Slam Round of 16.
"Of course, it feels great," Andreeva said afterwards. "It was a very special win for me. It was tough to play against [Gracheva]. She's a French player, my good friend. I'm very happy that I managed to win this match.
"Big court, big stage. There was a lot of crowd, a lot of people. So I'm just proud of the way I managed to stay calm and keep playing my game."
However, the direction of Monday's match was nearly very different from how it eventually turned out. In the first set, Gracheva fired a big backhand to reach double set point at 5-4.
Andreeva survived that peril, hitting a strong serve on the first set point, then rallying Gracheva into a netted error on the second, on the way to a hold for 5-5.
Gracheva stumbled in the next game, hitting her first double fault of the day to drop serve. At 6-5, Andreeva served out the set with aplomb, hitting an ace to line up triple set point, then converting the second of that trio.
Finding the lines and relentlessly chasing down balls, Andreeva won the last four games of the match. The second set was epitomized by match point, where the teen scampered all over the court, then sent a forehand winner down the line to prevail.
Swiatek vs Vondrousova
Iga Swiatek was 19 years old and set to play her second French Open main draw in 2020. It was already a weird tournament. Moved to the autumn because of Covid, everything about the fortnight felt eerie. Then Swiatek saw the draw. She was to face the Marketa Vondrousova, who was the runner-up a year before, in her opening round.
Swiatek lost three games in her first match to kick off one of the most dominant runs to a major title in the sport's history. She lost only 28 games over seven matches, the second-fewest games dropped en route to the Roland Garros title.
Four years on and Swiatek and Vondrousova will meet again in Paris, this time with a spot in the semifinals on the line. Since that first meeting, Swiatek has become a four-time major champion and a dominant World No.1. Vondrousova overcame a litany of tough injuries to become a major champion herself, winning Wimbledon last year.
In fact, when reigning Australian Open champion Aryna Sabalenka advanced to the quarterfinals Monday, this marked the first time all four reigning Grand Slam champions made the final eight since the 2012 US Open.
Swiatek will be the the heavy favorite. She has yet to lose a set to Vondrousova and comes into the match off her 40-minute demolition job on Anastasia Potapova. Vondrousova has cruised through her first four matches as well, but all her wins came against players ranked outside the Top 100.
Jabeur vs Gauf
After sealing her spot in the first major quarterfinal since Wimbledon last year, Ons Jabeur celebrated with the Tunisian fans in song. It was yet another indelible celebratory moment for the tour's resident "Minister of Happiness."
"I sang, and it didn't rain, so maybe I'll be a singer," Jabeur said jokingly.
Can she give herself a change at an encore? Gauff and Jabeur will face off for a seventh time, but for the first time, a spot in the French Open semifinals are on the line. This is well-tread territory for Gauff, who finished runner-up here in 2022.
But Jabeur has never made it past the quarterfinals in Paris. She did win the junior girls' title in 2011, becoming the first Arab to win a junior Grand Slam since 1964. But the three-time Grand Slam finalist is contesting only her second Roland Garros quarterfinal on Tuesday.
"I have to believe in myself even more, and I have a lot of skills," Jabeur said. "I can bother her. It's not going to be easy to win the match, but tactically I'll be discussing with my coach, and we'll be ready. We'll prepare."
The base tactics are simple: attack Gauff's second serve and work to break down her forehand. The 20-year-old American is one of the best movers in the game, but Jabeur has the arsenal to keep her off balance and exploit openings.
"She's such a fighter on the court," Jabeur said. "I hope I can play good and I can play my game because I know I can bother her as well.
"But it's going to be definitely a great fight between us."
The challenge for Gauff will be not looking ahead to the potential semifinal showdown looming with Swiatek. Gauff played one of her better matches against Swiatek in the Rome semifinals two weeks ago and is surely champing at the bit for another crack.
Only one of the six matches between Gauff and Jabeur have gone a full three sets. This will be their first meeting of the season. Gauff rolled in their last, a 6-0, 6-1 win at the WTA Finals in Cancun. She's also won their two previous meetings on red clay, including a 6-3, 6-1 win at Roland Garros in 2021.
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