- Last year’s beaten finalist battles back from one set down
- Tunisian next faces second seed Aryna Sabalenka in the last four
Ons Jabeur is known back home in Tunisia as the Minister of Happiness. She’s a pirouetting, skipping, sliding cartoon on the court. She plays like a video game character if someone dropped the controller and all the trick shot combinations were mashed at once.
Elena Rybakina is shy. She’s nice, she’s polite. She unexpectedly has the serve of someone dropping a bowling ball from the roof of a building. In last year’s final, when she bested a devastated Jabeur in three sets (3-6, 6-2, 6-2) to win her maiden grand slam, she celebrated akin to someone who had just claimed £10 from a scratch card. In a way it was refreshing, now that players will lie star-fish on their back at winning low-tier Challenger events.