Tennis
Crazy breakthrough of a tennis star from Russia. She carried out the defector to the screams of the French
Mirra Andreeva / Photo: © Dan Istitene / Staf / Getty Images Sport / Gettyimages.ru
Now Andreeva will play in the quarterfinals of Roland Garros for the first time.
In the ⅛ final of the women’s singles at Roland Garros, the last Russian woman who was not eliminated came face to face with the last representative of France remaining in the draw. It is curious that both Mirra Andreeva and Varvara Gracheva were born in Russia, and now live and train in France. But one of them switched to a foreign flag, and the other refused such an opportunity.
The audience desperately supported the newly minted Frenchwoman and did not hesitate to boo the young Russian, but this did not particularly affect the result. Andreeva punished the defector, winning a brilliant victory in front of the French fans.
Active support
In the fourth round of Roland Garros, Russian Andreeva and former Russian, and now representative of France, Gracheva met. For the girls, the confrontation was the first, but the bookmakers had no difficulty in determining the favorite. It was proposed to bet on the native of Krasnoyarsk, who occupies 38th place in the WTA rankings, with odds of 1.25. For the victory of her opponent, who is the 88th racket in the world, the odds were 4.03.
Both athletes reached the fourth round of Roland Garros for the first time. On the way to meeting her opponent, Andreeva defeated American Emina Bektas, former world number one from Belarus Victoria Azarenka, and then another US representative Peyton Stearns. Gracheva started with a sensational victory over sixth-seeded Greek Maria Sakkari, then knocked out American Bernarda Peru and Romanian Camelia Begu from the fight.
The French public quickly decided on the sympathies that were on Gracheva’s side. The girl often makes positive statements about her new homeland and even managed to learn “La Marseillaise.” The fans actively supported Varvara, and were not at all shy about celebrating after Andreeva’s failures, and at times even whistled when the Russian woman was emotionally happy about her own successes.
Smiles and Bugs
Mirra could have made a break already in the first game, Gracheva saved herself. Then Varvara, on someone else’s serve, had a chance to increase the advantage, but for the time being the former and present Russians did not allow each other to get ahead. In the seventh game, Andreeva finally seized the advantage, breaking the French tennis player’s serve. But the opponent immediately corrected the situation, and then built on her success, earning a double set point on the Russian’s serve.
The game did not want to end, and after a few minutes Mirra was serving for a set. Gracheva’s game simply went wrong, if for the time being Andreeva made a lot of mistakes, and Varvara pulled out some incredible balls, then at the end of the set the situation completely changed. The Russian woman did not miss the chance and, having won the game with a score of 7:5, went to rest in a good mood.
At the beginning of the second game, Andreeva immediately made a break, and then led with a score of 2:0. Varvara urgently needed to save the situation; things seemed to start looking up in the third game. In the most difficult struggle, she was able to achieve local success and even returned the smile that had been lost to her face. And then Mirra generously gave her opponent a game, the score became equal again and it seemed that there was no point in predicting anything in this crazy confrontation.
In the end, she didn’t take advantage of Grachev’s gift; Mirra scratched out another game, reduced the number of errors, and after a while, with the score 5:2, she served for the match. Varvara was unable to perform a miracle, no matter how much the tribunes hoped for it. Andreeva brought the matter to victory and finally allowed herself to smile. In the first quarterfinal of Roland Garros, the young Russian woman will have to fight one of the strongest tennis players on the planet, Arina Sabalenka.
Source: Sportbox
I am a sports journalist who has written for a number of Sportish. I have a background in journalism and have been writing since I was young. My main focus is sports news, but I also write about general news. I am currently working as an author at Sportish.