Tatjana Maria was only able to embarrass her opponent in the second sentence
Quelle: dpa/Kirsty Wigglesworth
The German fairy tale in Wimbledon came to an abrupt end. The German surprise semi-finalist Tatjana Maria lost to the Tunisian Ons Jabeur in three sets. The second in the world rankings only had a short period of weakness.
TAtjana Maria took a deep breath and was able to smile again after being hugged by her good friend Ons Jabeur. Despite another energy performance, the 34-year-old missed the next Wimbledon fairy tale and the sensational first entry into a Grand Slam final. After 1:43 hours, the mother of two had to admit defeat to Jabeur from Tunisia, second in the world rankings, in the semi-finals on Thursday with 2:6, 6:3, 1:6. “It was difficult to run after their balls. She has to grill for me to make up for all my running on the pitch,” said the winner.
For the biggest success of her career, Maria collects the equivalent of 626,000 euros. The surprise of the tournament was not able to reach the Wimbledon final as the sixth German tennis player after Cilly Aussem, Hilde Krahwinkel, Steffi Graf, Sabine Lisicki and Angelique Kerber.
Jabeur is now the first Arab player in a Grand Slam final, where she meets Jelena Rybakina from Kazakhstan, who beat Romania’s Simona Halep 6-3, 6-3. Jabeur is good friends with the Maria family. “Tatjana is an inspiration for many players, including me. Such a comeback after two children, I still can’t believe it,” said Jabeur about her opponent, who gave birth to her second daughter 15 months ago.
With a big smile, Maria walked across the pitch before the first point, the two friends waved a few steps apart to the audience. Maria went back to her usual routines in advance. Although she visited Center Court with her daughter Charlotte in the morning, the eight-year-old followed the game as usual from the facility’s childcare. “We don’t want to change anything,” Maria said before the game. “She’s keeping her fingers crossed for me there and watching it on the TV over there. It’s a match like everyone else for them, so we leave it like that.”
Jabeur coldly showed Maria the limits
The fact that it was no ordinary match for both players became apparent in the early stages. As usual, Maria relied on her unorthodox style of play with many undercut balls also on the forehand, Jabeur got involved in the slice duel, the first game alone lasted eight minutes. Strong nerves, Maria fended off three breakballs and got the 1:0.
But Jabeur kept the command, let Maria run with stop balls and slowly increased the tempo. The winner of the preparatory tournament in Berlin won three games in a row. Both players smiled when Jabeur lost a spectacular point after a pirouette half-volley. But the favorite was serious. Ice cold, she showed Maria the limits and converted the first set point after only 38 minutes through a mistake by her opponent.
Maria had already lost the first round three times in the tournament and had always come back with great willingness to run. As she saved two break points at 1-1, she threw a fist at her box, where husband and trainer Charles-Edouard applauded. For the first time, Maria was also able to put pressure on Jabeur when she served and used her first break ball directly to stop her. Jabeur showed nerves, made more and more mistakes in addition to magic balls, Maria pulled away 4-1.
Maria missed a first set ball when the score was 5:2 and Jabeur’s serve, and with her own service she was able to celebrate after a total of 76 minutes after an unsuccessful stop by her opponent. The decisive round started extremely badly, Jabeur made the early break with a passing ball – and suddenly he could not be stopped. When Maria conceded the 0:4 due to an unnecessary mistake on the net, Jabeur kissed her finger and looked happily at the sky. Maria brought her own serve one last time – and was then beaten.
