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Jasmine Paolini, Barbora Krejcikova to meet for Wimbledon title after stirring semifinal wins

2024-07-12 22:05:01

LONDON — Jasmine Paolini kept coming back, kept coming back, kept coming back against Donna Vekic in what would become the longest Wimbledon women’s semifinal on record — after dropping the opening set, after being two games from defeat in each of the last two sets, after twice trailing by a break in the third set.

And all the while, this is what Paolini kept telling herself Thursday: “Try, point by point” and “Fight for every ball.”

Paolini, who turned 28 in January, never had won a match at the All England Club until last week and now will participate in her second consecutive Grand Slam final, thanks to a rollicking 2-6, 6-4, 7-6 (10-8) victory against the unseeded Vekic over 2 hours and 51 minutes on Centre Court.

“This match,” said the seventh-seeded Paolini, who will face No. 31 Barbora Krejcikova for the title on Saturday, “I will remember forever.”

As will many of the thousands of spectators and millions of TV viewers who watched what Paolini called “a roller coaster of emotions.”

The same description would be fitting for Thursday’s second women’s singles semifinal, which lasted 44 fewer minutes but contained its own share of plot twists as 2021 French Open champion Krejcikova came back to eliminate 2022 Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4.

Saturday’s winner will be the eighth woman to leave the All England Club with the title in the past eight editions of the tournament.

Krejcikova, a 28-year-old from the Czech Republic, trailed 4-0 at the start, reeled off four of five games to take the second set, then earned the pivotal break to move ahead 5-3 in the third against the fourth-seeded Rybakina, a 25-year-old from Kazakhstan who entered the day with a 19-2 career mark in Wimbledon singles matches.

“During the second set, somewhere in the middle, I was getting my momentum,” Krejcikova said. “And when I broke her, I started to be in a zone — and I didn’t want to leave the zone.”

AP photo by Mosa’ab Elshamy / Barbora Krejcikova celebrates after winning a point against Elena Rybakina in their semifinal match Thursday at Wimbledon.

Still, it couldn’t approach the drama produced by Paolini and Vekic. Consider: Vekic, a 28-year-old from Croatia who was making her debut in a Grand Slam semifinal, ended up taking more points (118-111), delivering more winners (42-26) and breaking serve more often (4-3) than her Italian opponent.

“She was hitting winners everywhere,” Paolini said.

Paolini never went away, though, eventually converting her third match point when Vekic sent a forehand wide.

This showing on the grass courts at the All England Club follows Paolini’s runner-up finish to top-ranked Iga Swiatek on the red clay at Roland Garros during the French Open last month. Paolini is the first player to reach the women’s singles finals in the French Open and Wimbledon in the same season since Serena Williams in 2016.

“These last months have been crazy for me,” Paolini said with a laugh.

No different was Thursday’s win, more exhausting than easy.

Vekic often was in obvious distress, crying between points and while sitting in her changeover chair late in the third set — because, she said afterward, of pain in an arm and a leg — and often looked up at her guest box with a flushed face. She iced her right forearm between games.

“I thought I was going to die in the third set,” said Vekic, who repeatedly closed her eyes, sighed or shook her head during her news conference. “I didn’t know how I could keep playing.”

How surprising is Paolini’s recent surge? Well, she never had managed to make it past the second round at any major — losing in the first or second round in 16 appearances in a row — until she got to the fourth round at the Australian Open in January.

And then there’s this: Paolini’s career record at Wimbledon was 0-3 until this fortnight. Indeed, she did not own a single tour-level win on grass anywhere until a tuneup event at Eastbourne last month.

Krejcikova is not nearly as out of nowhere, given that she has been a Grand Slam champion and was previously ranked No. 2 in singles, as well as a seven-time major champ who has been No. 1 in doubles. She’s also now 6-2 in the majors against past Grand Slam champs.

Her mentor, the late Jana Novotna, won Wimbledon in 1998, and Krejcikova teared up while speaking about the fellow Czech player’s influence.

“I have so many beautiful memories, and when I step on the court here, I’m just fighting for every single ball, because I think that’s what she would want me to do,” Krejcikova said. “I just miss her very much. I miss her so much.”

AP photo by Alberto Pezzali / Donna Vekic returns to Jasmine Paolini on Thursday at the All England Club in London. Vekic lost in three sets to Paolini in a match that took 2 hours and 51 minutes to complete, making it the longest Wimbledon women’s singles semifinal on record.

Like Krejcikova, Paolini needed about 1 1/2 sets to get going. Her perseverance was on display at 4-all in the second set, when she sprinted with her back to the net to put her racket on a lob, somehow getting it back over, and Vekic badly missed an overhead.

Paolini held there to lead 5-4, then broke for the set with a forehand winner, looked up at her guest box — where her relatives and her doubles partner, Sara Errani, were on their feet — and screamed in Italian: “Forza!” (“Let’s go!”)

Vekic, playing her fifth three-setter in six matches, headed to the locker room before the last set, recalibrated and came out strong. She broke in the opening game, helped by a forehand return winner on a second serve, followed by Paolini’s missed forehand on an 11-stroke exchange.

Vekic soon led 3-1, and after a later trade of breaks, she was up 4-3.

“I believed I could win,” Vekic said, “until the end.”

Paolini never stopped believing, but with another major title shot secured, her comments before heading to the locker room made clear she was surely relieved to stop playing for a bit.

“Now I’m going to the ice bath,” Paolini said, “because my legs are a little bit tired.”

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