Madrid – Iga Swiatek survived “one of the strange matches” after losing his first six games before beating Madison Keys 0-6, 6-3, 6-2 on Wednesday and recovering on track to defend her title in Madrid Open.
The 21-year-old American beat teenager Mira Andreva in straight sets in the WTA 1000 quarterfinals, the youngest since 2009, before facing second-placed Swiatek in the semi-finals.
Swiatek overwhelmed Key early in the quarterfinals, but ultimately found a way to pass the fifth-place American on Center Court.
“It was one of the strangest matches I’ve played,” Swiatek said. “Maddie was playing perfectly at first, but I wasn’t aggressive at all. Just getting Maddie back the ball and it made me make more mistakes and changed momentum.”
Swiatek said of going down 0-6 at the start of the match:
This was the first meeting between the two as Swiatek wasted match points in the semi-finals of the Australian Open, which the Keys acquired.
Swiatek is about to reach her third Madrid Final. She defeated Arena Sabalenka last year after losing to her in 2023.
Top-ranked Sabalenka advanced two tiebreakers, beating Marta Kostyuk 7-6 (4), 7-6 (7).
Sabalenka will face 17th seed Elina Svitolina to compete in the final. Svitorina defeated Moyuka Mizushima 6-2, 6-1
Ranked fourth, Goff is past seventh Mira Andreva 7-5, 6-1. Andreva turned 18 on Tuesday.
Since the introduction of the WTA 1000 tier, only the 2009 Indian Wells quarterfinals between Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Agnieszka Radwanska had a younger age, the WTA said.
Gauff recovered after taking a break 5-4 in the first set. She faced two set points.
“From the ground, I think I’ve dictated most of the meetings, so I’m very pleased,” Gouf said. “Overall, I’m happy with everything.”
Gauff and Andreeva were able to finish the match in the previous round just before play was suspended due to a massive blackout that stopped Spain and Portugal on Monday. I had to postpone more than 20 matches at the Caja Magica Tennis Complex.
On the men’s side, Matteo Arnald supported the victory over Novak Djokovic in the second round by defeating Francis Tierfor 6-3, 7-5 to reach the quarterfinals of the ATP 1000 tournament for the second time.
Arnaldi is now in his first career victory over his top 20 opponents for the first time in his career, three times in a row.
The Italian player will then face Jack Draper. Jack Draper moved forward by beating Tommy Paul 6-2, 6-2 in the 68th minute. The sixth draper, who was seeded fifth in the tournament, won his first ATP 1,000 title this year with the Indian Wells.
In other results, the seed No. 10, Italy’s Lorenzomsetti, defeated Australia’s sixth seed Alex Deminaurus 6-4, 6-2, followed by Canada’s Gabriel Diallo, 5-7, 7-6 (7), and 6-4 Grigor Dimitrov.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
