Mirra Andreeva teaches lessons – Kommersant

The sensational performance of 16-year-old Russian Mirra Andreeva at Roland Garros has come to an end. Having won the first set of the match of the 1/16 finals against the 6th racket of the world American Coco Gauff, she still lost to her in three games. Another Russian woman, Ekaterina Alexandrova, also dropped out of the fight, having lost a match point in the third set of the meeting with the Brazilian Beatriz Addad Maya. About the latest events that took place at the famous Parisian tennis stadium, – the correspondent of “Kommersant” Evgeny Fedyakov.

“Maybe it’s good that I lost today,” Mirra Andreeva reasoned in the main hall of the Roland Garros press center, answering a question from a Kommersant correspondent about the lessons that can be learned from losing the sixth racket of the world, Coco Gauff. “Perhaps this is a defeat will teach me how to play regardless of the score or whatever.”

The match between the Russian woman and the 19-year-old American, who until relatively recently successfully worked with Andreeva’s current coach, Frenchman Jean-Christophe Forel, took place on the ten-thousandth court of Suzanne Lenglen, the second largest at Roland Garros. And, of course, it aroused even more interest than previous meetings with the participation of the youngest participant in the third round of the current tournament. Before the game, the press center talked about the possibility of another Andreev sensation, and the first set confirmed its reality. Having taken three games on other people’s serves, the rivals went to a tie-break, which Andreeva finished with a blow from the right right through. However, she failed to develop success. Mistakes followed, and the situation came under the complete control of Gauff, who won in 2 hours and 3 minutes – 6:7 (5:7), 6:1, 6:1. Having superiority in the speed of the first and second innings, the Russian woman nevertheless lost, because she won only 17 points to 35 with blows from the rebound right through.

“I gave 100% in the first set. And then I realized that I can win the match, and I began to worry, afraid to miss this opportunity. But in the second set there was a feeling that I was missing both mentally and physically. This, perhaps, is the difference, ”explained Andreeva, speaking of the sharp contrast between the first game and the second half of the match. And the Kommersant correspondent noted to himself that his interlocutor answered a similar question about the reasons for the defeat from the second racket of the world Arina Sobolenko in Madrid in much the same way. That is, there is a certain trend that Andreeva and her team need to work on overcoming.

The failure in the match against Gauff calls into question the stay of the Russian woman in the top hundred after the end of the current tournament.

But the likelihood that she will take off there from her current 143rd place is still quite high. Although the high rating of Andreeva is a thing to come. In any case, the world tennis press does not doubt this at all. By the way, the Russian woman once again consolidated the favorable impression she had already made on journalists in Paris. She looked tired and distressed, but she answered questions reasonably, not for show. And commenting on the remark that she received from the judge on the tower for undisciplined behavior in the first game, without further ado, she emphasized that it was impossible to behave like that.

Andreeva’s defeat was not the only Russian setback on the seventh day of the tournament. Eliminated from the fight and Ekaterina Alexandrova, who met with the Brazilian Beatrice Addad Maya. It was a confrontation of equal rivals. The South American is now in 14th place in the world rankings, and the Russian tennis player, who in Rome and Paris tried to train under the guidance of Dmitry Tursunov, who has earned a reputation as one of the most successful specialists in women’s tennis over the past few years, is in 23rd. The match, which lasted 2 hours and 48 minutes, turned out to be very stubborn. In the course of the third set Alexandrova lost – 1:4, after which she took four games in a row and in the tenth game had a match point on someone else’s serve. However, it was not possible to realize it in a stubborn draw of 15 strokes, and then the opponent made a decisive break and kept her serve. As a result – 7:5, 4:6, 5:7. The third round, which Alexandrova reached at the Grand Slam tournaments for the sixth time, still remains insurmountable for her.

Saturday began at Roland Garros with an unexpected press conference by Elena Rybakina. Last year’s Wimbledon champion and finalist of the January Australian Open, who was supposed to play the match against Spaniard Sara Sorribes Tormo at that very time, announced that she was withdrawing from the tournament due to a certain virus circulating in Paris that hit her immune system weakened by allergies. system. Wishing good health to the journalist, who sneezed loudly almost at the moment of the announcement of this diagnosis, the fourth racket of the world clarified that she had not slept well for the last two nights, and the morning warm-up finally convinced her of her own unwillingness to play at full strength. Moreover, it is possible that now Rybakina will have to adjust the schedule of her grass series, during which she planned to play in Berlin and Eastbourne.

The decision of Kazakhstan’s tennis hope seriously affected the balance of power in the upper half of the grid. After all, it is headed by the first racket of the world, Iga Sventek, who this year lost to Rybakina three times in a row, and in the afternoon defeated the Chinese Wang Xinyu – 6:0, 6:0. It cannot be said that the Polish world prima does not have worthy rivals at all, but before the start of the tournament, Rybakina and Belarusian Arina Sabolenko looked the most dangerous of them, with whom she can only play in the final. Now, however, Schwentek’s chances of defending his Parisian title have grown markedly.