MADRID, 4 (EUROPA PRESS)
The Catalan, who starts as the second seed of the event, had not played since her elimination in early July at the Wimbledon tournament against the Romanian Simona Halep and needed more than two and a half hours to get rid of her rival, 21 years old, 240 in the WTA ranking and daughter of Czech Hana Mandlikova, winner of four Grand Slams in the 1980s.
However, Badosa started the duel very solid and did not foreshadow the problems that he would find. Despite losing the first game of the match with her serve, she recovered with four in a row and comfortably closed the first set.
But the American reacted and equalized things for a second heat where Badosa already found more opposition. The Spanish knew how to replicate Mandlik’s first ‘break’, but she stood firm and broke again at 5-5 to finally lead the clash to a tense partial final where the number four in the world was on the ropes.
The American player achieved a love break in the seventh game and had a serve to achieve victory, but she did not take advantage of it. Even so, she broke again to have a new opportunity at 6-5, but the Catalan once again had nerves of steel to force a ‘tie-break’ where she no longer forgave (7/5). Now, in the quarterfinals, the winner of the attractive duel between the American Coco Gauff and the Japanese Naomi Osaka will be measured.
“I think sometimes it’s a bit confusing when you play against a player with her ranking because sometimes you don’t expect that kind of scoreline and you think you’re not doing things right, but to be honest I think I played pretty well and it did. simply incredible,” Badosa acknowledged in statements collected by the WTA website.
