Final Four: Cincinnati Open Women’s SF Preview

By Richard Osborn

[1] IGA SWIATEK (POL) VS. [3] ARYNA SABALENKA

11 A.M. | CENTER COURT

This will be the 12th edition of what has become one of the more intriguing rivalries in tennis. The 23-year-old Pole Swiatek holds a lopsided 8-3 advantage in the head-to-heads, but the matches have gone the distance on five of those occasions. The top-ranked Swiatek had to save three championship points against Sabalenka earlier this year in the Madrid final, prevailing 7-6(7) in the third.

“Mentally, she’s really strong and she moves really well, putting a lot of pressure back on you. When you go against her, you know that you have to compete at a high level,” said Sabalenka, 26, a three-time Cincinnati Open semifinalist. “If you see an opportunity, you have to get it, otherwise she’s going to get the match. I love those battles. Those are the matches where you can get better as a player. Even if you lose, you can learn a lot. It can help you in the future.”

A five-time major titlist, Swiatek came into the tournament on the heels of a bronze-medal performance at the Olympic Games, citing the Cincinnati Open as an opportunity to reset, readjust to the hard courts, and try out some of the shots/tactics she’s been working on on the practice court.

“We’re both players that deserve to be in semifinals, finals, because we’re working really hard,” said Swiatek ahead of the matchup against the two-time Australian Open winner Sabalenka. “I respect Aryna so much. She’s a great tennis player, what can I say? She’s always fighting. She has great shots, great backhand, a lot of power.”

[6] JESSICA PEGULA (USA) VS. PAULA BADOSA (ESP)

NOT BEFORE 1 P.M. | CENTER COURT

If anyone is rounding into title-ready form in the lead-up to the 2024 US Open, it’s Jessica Pegula. After a ho-hum start to the year, the 30-year-old American picked up a WTA 500 trophy on grass this summer in Berlin. Post-Olympics, she’s now a perfect eight-for-eight, arriving in Cincinnati on the heels of a successful title defense in Canada.

“I’ve basically turned my year around in the last few weeks,” said Pegula, who earlier this year parted ways with coach David Witt and aligned herself with the duo of Mark Knowles and Mark Merklein. “There were a lot of different challenges this year that I hadn’t had to face the last few years. But that’s just the way it goes sometimes. It’s nothing new to me. Early on in my career, I had a lot of difficult stuff to get through. I think I just trusted that I’d been through it before. I’ve always come out better, I’ve always come out stronger, and I figure it out eventually. I think you just have to, at some point, put in the hard work and just trust that it’s going to happen when it needs to.”

Will Pegula make it back-to-back WTA 1000 crowns? To do so, she’ll first have to navigate a tricky semifinal opponent in the resurgent Paula Badosa. The former No. 2 plummeted outside the Top 100 after doctors deemed a stress fracture in her back career-threatening. But the 2021 Indian Wells champion recently claimed her first tour-level crown in two years in Washington, D.C., and has now set her sights on a return to the Top 10.

“I always put these expectations,” said Badosa, a 6-3, 6-2 winner over Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the quarterfinals. “It’s part of me. I keep pushing myself, sometimes too much. That’s why I have my coach to balance that. But my goal is to be back where I was before. I feel I belong there. I will try my best to get there as soon as possible.”

“Paula has been playing some good tennis, and seems to have kind of turned her year around in finding some form,” said Pegula, a spotless 2-0 against the New York-born Spaniard. “We all know that when she can find that form, she’s a top player. Super strong, powerful groundstrokes, good athlete.”

“She’s an amazing player,” said Badosa of her semifinal foe. “She’s coming in with a lot of confidence. It’s a match I’m looking forward to because I like these big matches.”