Tunisian Ons Jabeur, the last representative of the top 10 in the race, qualified for the most prestigious final of her career in Madrid, her first in the WTA 1000, by sweeping the Russian qualifier Ekaterina Alexandrova (45th) 6-2, 6 -3 in one hour on Thursday.
In the final on Saturday, Jabeur will face the American Jessica Pegula (14th), victorious at midnight past the Swiss Jil Teichmann (35th) 6-3, 6-4.
For Jabeur (10th, 27), this will be the sixth final of his career. She has only one title to her name so far, obtained in Birmingham in 2021.
For Pegula (28), it will be the fourth. She’s only won one so far too, in Washington in 2019.
In the WTA 1000 tournament, the category equivalent to the Masters 1000 on the ATP circuit, the highest following the Grand Slams, neither had ever done better than a semi-final. In Indian Wells in 2021 for Jabeur, in Miami in April for Pegula.
For her first two tournaments of the season on clay, the Tunisian reached the final in Charleston (United States) and the quarter-finals in Stuttgart (Germany).
In the quarter-finals on Wednesday, Jabeur put an authoritative end to the career of Simona Halep, ex-world No.1 today 21st and double Grand Slam winner (6-3, 6-2 in 67 minutes).
Jessica Pegula, she had won only one match on ocher in 2022 before the Madrid tournament, in Charleston (United States), on American soil. She saved a match point in her first round in the Spanish capital ( once morest Giorgi). She hasn’t lost a set since.
