Sofia Kenin became a Roland Garros finalist on Wednesday in a dream year for her, which began with the title of Australian Open champion And you can end up with another major's trophy in their windows. The American 21 and sixth in the world beat the veteran of 30 and 11 in the ranking Petra Kvitova in two sets (6-4 and 7-5 in 1h: 45) and will face on Saturday at 15:00 (DMAX and Eurosport) to the Polish Iga Swiatek, which beat Argentina's Podoroska 6-2 and 6-1.
One of the keys to Kenin's success at the French Grand Slam is her incredible ability to land backhand winners: in six games the American has scored 99 for a total of 194. With the drive he has done less (82), something absolutely unusual. To give an example and taking into account that in men's tennis it is not easy to counteract the power of the rivals, Rafa Nadal has executed 22 of his 141 backhand winners in five games. Before Kvitova, Kenin 'only' added eight 'backhands', but still dominated the game, almost always at ease.
Kvitova, who had won in the only match between the two on land (Madrid 2019), could not with Kenin's nerve and mobility, who has 16 majors victories in 2020. Sofia's career has definitely taken off and she can take another giant step on Saturday, with Swiatek's permission. The American is already fourth in the ranking and will overtake the Japanese Naomi Osaka in third place if she is the champion of Paris.
Results and schedule.