Rome
Top seed Simona Halep overcame Spaniard Garbine Muguruza 6-3 4-6 6-4 on Sunday to reach the Italian Open final and stay on course for her third straight WTA title.
Romanian Halep, who skipped the U.S. Open amid the COVID-19 pandemic, won the Dubai title before the Tour was suspended and lifted the Prague crown on its resumption.
The 2018 Roland Garros champion cruised through the opening set against Muguruza and was on course for an easy win but Muguruza, who took a medical timeout for a back issue, battled back from 2-4 down to win the second set and force a decider.
Watched on by a small group of fans who were welcomed back for the first time since the Tour was shut down, Halep regained focus in the third set and switched gears to surge ahead 5-1.
Muguruza was not done yet, however, as she clawed her way back to 5-4. But the 2016 French Open champion, who was serving to stay in the match, made successive double faults to gift victory to Halep.
The Romanian, who is looking to extend her winning run to 14 matches and seal a first title in Rome, will next face the winner of the second semi-final between Karolina Pliskova and Marketa Vondrousova.
Rafael Nadal suffered a stunning defeat to Diego Schwartzman in the Internazionali d’Italia quarter-finals – a major blow to French Open preparations for tennis’ king of clay.
A 6-2 7-5 loss to Schwartzman in Rome ended Nadal’s 100 per cent record in their rivalry, after nine previous wins for the Spaniard.
In their fifth clash on clay, and first on the surface since Nadal won in four sets in the 2018 Roland Garros quarter-finals, Schwartzman wobbled with victory in sight.
At 5-4 ahead in the second set he was broken to love by 12-time French Open winner Nadal. But the eighth seed magnificently broke back immediately and then held his nerve to complete a memorable success, finishing with a volley at the net out of the reach of the stranded Nadal.
The result ends the prospect of a final between Nadal and top seed Djokovic on Monday, with Schwartzman moving on to tackle Canadian Denis Shapovalov in the last four of the tournament.
“Today I played my best tennis. [It was] Very similar to Roland Garros against Rafa three years ago and I’m very happy,” Schwartzman said in his post-match interview on court.
“I was not thinking to beat him really because I was not playing good lately. But today I did my best and I’m very happy.”
There were clear mitigating circumstances behind Nadal’s unusually early exit, given this is his first tournament since February.
The 34-year-old elected to miss the resumption of tennis in the United States last month, skipping the US Open over concerns about long-haul international travel in the coronavirus period.
Shapovalov was a 6-2 3-6 6-2 winner against Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov earlier on Saturday.—AP
