Friday evening, Jasmine Paolini fought in front of Coco Gauff, in Cincinnati Open, gathering for a 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 quarter-final victory-his third victory against the American in as many meetings this year. Along the way, she also pushed a physical tension and the mental assessment of the competition.
Cincinnati: Draw | Scores | Game order
Paolini was afraid at the start of the third set when she drove on her ankle while hitting a current forehand that was too warm to handle. After being visited by the coach before the next match, she raised her shoulders of any persistent discomfort to quickly break the Gauff service.
Paolini had lost a handful of winning positions this year-including a defeat against Aoi Ito of 6-2, 4-1 before the last time in Montreal. And it seemed that another was going to pass through her fingers when she lost nine consecutive points of 3-1, 40-30 in the third.
Paolini stabilized when it counted the most, winning seven points in a row and 12 of the last 15 to reach its fifth semi-final of the season, and its second WTA 1000 level after raising the interaziali bnl of Italia trophy in May. GAUFF fought with the consistency, ending with 16 double defects and 62 uns forked errors in a 2 hour and 3 -minute match which included 14 service breaks.
“It was so difficult,” said Paolini afterwards. “At the beginning, I was just running out and tried to put the ball inside the field … But after a little, I started to feel better.
“I stayed there every point, I tried to fight at each point, and it worked.”
For a place in the final, Paolini will have to reverse a series of futility against the former player of the top 10 Veronika Kudermetova, who has reached her first semi-final WTA 1000 since 2023. She has lost three consecutive games against Kudermetova, although they did not play from her meeting during this tournament in 2021.
“She is a great player, a great service and big weapons,” said Paolini. “It’s always difficult to play against her … This one will be another story. She plays very well, I’m happy with my game here, so let’s see what I can do and I hope it’s going to be good.”
