got excited Karolina Muchova under the towel. The first Grand Slam final of his life after a Roland Garros great and an even better semifinal. Bat Aryna Sabalenka by 7-6 (5), 6-7 (5) and 7-5, in three hours and 13 minutes, and almost no words come out. But he repeats “Thank you” all the time and leaves it immortalized on camera.
It is Muchova, 26 years old, a tennis player of work and perseverance. By rank, world 43and by level, one step below Sabalenka, who arrived in Paris as the Australian Open champion and ready to take the Roland Garros trophy with a whipping.
But he runs into the Czech, who has already reached the quarterfinals at Wimbledon in 2019 and 2021, and the round of 16 at the 2020 US Open, but who is uncovered at this Roland Garros 2023. Smile and slanted eyes, displays one more tennis safe from the bottom, with 38 winners (to 44 for Sabalenka), but limited their errors to 27 to 53 for the Belarusian. As powerful in the rest as she is confident in moments of tension: she lifted nine break balls out of thirteen that the rival won, and even came back from a match point with a 5-2 down in the final set.
From there, Sabalenka’s sights melted. Unleashed and in a hurry to reach the final of Roland Garros, she chained error after error before a Muchova who put everything in. Control, calm and security that dismasted the 2 in the world.
