Spain’s Paula Badosa sealed another fantastic day in her excellent hard-court tour in North America on Saturday at the WTA 1000 in Cincinnati. She defeated Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the quarterfinals and will play American Jessica Pegula in the semifinals on Sunday.
In an unstoppable moment of play and physical form, Badosa (world number 36) crushed Pavlyuchenkova (n.28) by 6-3 and 6-2 in one hour and six minutes. The Catalan has not lost a single set so far in the tournament and is heading into the US Open, which begins on August 26 in New York, with fabulous sensations.
All the great moments of my career have happened in the United States
Paula Badosa
“I’m very happy. Three weeks ago I was, I don’t know, 70th in the world and now I’m already in the top 30 (after this tournament),” she said immediately after the match. “For me it was a goal to end the year like this but now I’m already a seed for the US Open, playing well, in other semi-finals… I don’t know, all the great moments of my career have happened in the US so I think it means something,” added with a smile the tennis player born in New York and who has won two of the four trophies in her career in this country (Indian Wells 2021 and Washington 2024).
Her next opponent in Cincinnati will be Pegula (No. 6), who struggled to eliminate Canadian Leylah Fernández (No. 26) 7-5, 6-7 (1), 7-6 (3) in three hours and four minutes. Badosa has faced the American twice: in Miami in 2022 she had to withdraw due to physical problems and in Charleston in 2023 she lost in two sets.
On the other side of the draw in Cincinnati there are two other big names on the circuit: the Polish Iga Swiatek (No. 1) and the Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka (No. 3).
But right now Badosa seems to fear no one after having won ten of her last eleven matches, which led her to conquer the WTA 500 in Washington two weeks ago (her first tournament since January 2022).
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Her journey through the desert with persistent physical problems and poor results seems to be behind her, so much so that in Cincinnati she will play the fourth WTA 1,000 semi-final of her career and her first since Indian Wells in March 2022.
Monologue in rooms
Badosa, who has said on several occasions that her recent performance has a lot to do with her physical improvement, started tonight with a small scare and had to save a break point from Pavlyuchenkova in her second serve. But after that isolated scare, the Spaniard showed the enormous strength and confidence, both with her serve and from the back of the court, that have led her to shine in recent weeks.
However, the Russian was soon brought down by her opponent’s firmness and began to accumulate errors that Badosa took advantage of wonderfully, breaking at her first opportunity (3-1). From then on, it was a non-stop monologue by Badosa, who closed the first set in 34 minutes by going to the net against a Pavlyuchenkova who, with her gaze lost and her arms akimbo, could not find any crack on the other side of the court.
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The second set followed a practically identical path, with Badosa very focused and showing no weakness and Pavlyuchenkova unable to reach that level. Thus, Badosa broke her rival’s serve twice and declared victory in Cincinnati once again in a summer full of smiles for her.
Double
Granollers and Zeballos also make it to the semi-finals
Granollers and Zeballos, who share the top spot in the world doubles rankings, beat the British pairing of Neal Skupski and New Zealander Michael Venus 6-4, 6-4 in one hour and 18 minutes in the quarter-finals. Granollers and Zeballos, who won the Montreal Masters 1000 last week, will be looking for a place in the final against Americans Mackenzie McDonald and Alex Michelsen.
In the men’s singles draw, world number one Jannik Sinner of Italy and number 4 Alexander Zverev of Germany will face off in a powerful clash after eliminating Russian Andrey Rublev (number 6) and American Ben Shelton (number 14), respectively, on Saturday. The home fans will have an American in the other semi-final with Frances Tiafoe (number 27), who advanced due to the withdrawal of Polish Hubert Hurkacz (number 7) due to injury. Tiafoe will play for a place in the Cincinnati final with Dane Holger Rune (number 16), who beat British Jack Draper (number 28) in the quarter-finals.
