The semi-finalists at the Dongfeng Voyah · Wuhan Open, the last WTA 1000 event of the year being held in China, were decided on Friday, and will see top-seeded Aryna Sabalenka and Coco Gauff square off for a place in the final, while home favourite Zheng Qinwen makes history when she meets her fellow countrywoman, Wang Xinyu, compete for the other spot.
Focus on my footwork, go to the net, finish the point over there. Yeah, on this slow surface, you have to go there. You have to be brave enough and finish the point there. I think that’s the main plan. It worked really well in our last meeting, so I’ll just stick to the plan.
Sabalenka dropped a set to Kazakh Yulia Putintseva on Thursday before winning through, 1-6 6-4 6-0, but she delivered a more commanding performance on Friday to dismiss Poland’s Magdalena Frech, 6-2 6-2, in the quarter-finals.
The Belarusian World No 2 also needed 2 tight sets to get past Katerina Siniakova in the 2nd-round but, against Frech, Sabalenka fired 42 winners in 16 games, and wrapped up the win after an hour and 23 minutes.
She now will face Gauff, the No 4 seed and Beijing champion, for the 8th time, with their last 2 meetings both coming on the Grand Slam stage, where the 20-year American triumphed in the 2023 US Open final, and the Belarusian responded with a win at this year’s Australian Open semi-finals, while Gauff leads the overall head-to-head 4-3.
In contrast to her match against Putintseva, Sabalenka raced out of the blocks against Frech, striking a clean return winner on her first point of the match to set the tone, and, by the time she had raced out to a 4-0 lead, she had tallied 14 winners from every part of the court, a number that reached 22 by the end of the first set.
The second wasn’t quite as spectacular in terms of Sabalenka’s mix of shot-making, but it did showcase her sharp match management.
She sealed a 3-0 double-break lead after repeatedly finding winners to deny Frech on 5 game points, but the Pole broke for the first time in the following game, and held 2 points to level at 3-3, only for the No 1 seed to hold off any come-back in fine style.
The key against Gauff, Sabalenka stresses, is pressure, and she can achieve that by moving forward.
“Focus on my footwork, go to the net, finish the point over there,” Sabalenka said. “Yeah, on this slow surface, you have to go there. You have to be brave enough and finish the point there. I think that’s the main plan.
“It worked really well in our last meeting, so I’ll just stick to the plan.”
Coco Gauff marched into the semis has been somewhat easier, and the American has yet to drop a set, notching up a 6-4 6-1 win over Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk, the 13th seed, on Thursday, and following up with a 6-0 6-4 victory over Magda Linette on Friday in an hour and 24-minute, marking the Beijing champion’s 9th straight match-win in China.
Gauff’s previous win against Linette was a 3-set triumph at the 2021 US Open when she was 17 years old.
Meeting the Polish 32-year old veteran again 3 years later, the current World No 4 was under no threat of losing a set against a player who had toppled a pair of Russian seeds in No 11 Liudmila Samsonova in the 1st-round, and then No 8 Daria Kasatkina, 6-2 6-3, to reach her first WTA 1000 quarter-final.
“I’m really happy with how I played,” Gauff said. “Obviously a smooth first set. Had chances to maybe close it out in the 5-3 game in the second, but happy I was able to close it out on my serve.”
She never lost her serve, and broke Linette 4 times to become the first woman through to the Last 4 on Friday in Wuhan, saving all 5 of the break points she faced, 4 of which came in the first set, and 3 of them in her first service game, when, having already broken the Pole to start the match, she wiggled out of a 15-40 deficit to establish an early 2-0 lead.
Gauff won 12 of 14 points at a critical point of the second set, when, trailing 2-3, she held to love, broke Linette at 15, and held again to 15 to put herself one game away from victory, and eased her way to the finish line.
Despite never losing her serve, Gauff coughed up 8 double-faults, and her second delivery was of concern for the American, who won less than 50% of those points, including a 4-for-13 clip in the first set.
Gauff struck 19 winners to Linette’s 13, and hit just 16 unforced errors, while the Pole produced 22 miscues.
The American is the youngest player to secure 50 or more WTA main-draw wins, which this year includes 2 at the Olympics, in back-to-back seasons since Caroline Wozniacki in 2009-10, while she is the third player to do so on the Hologic WTA Tour this season, after Iga Swiatek and Sabalenka.
Later, Zheng Qinwen, the World No 7, continued her march through her home tournament, battling past Canadian Leylah Fernandez and Jasmine Paolini, Italy’s No 5, dropping sets to both, but reaching the Last 4 unscathed.
On Thursday the Chinese No 1 eventually found an emphatic solution to Fernandez, the 2021 US Open finalist, 5-7 6-3 6-0, and then upset Paolini in the quarters, 6-2 3-6 6-3, to set up the first-ever all-Chinese semi-final at a WTA 1000 event.
The 22-year-old Olympic champion will face 23-year-old Wang Xinyu on Saturday, with the winner advancing to her first WTA 1000 final.
“It means we have great players in China,” Zheng said. “Our base level was more higher than before, so that’s a good thing.
“I mean, it’s never easy to play against opponent same like your country. There is a different pressure. I know that. I think we grow basically in the same tournaments. Play the same tournaments in juniors.”
Wuhan will be Zheng’s 5th semi-final of the season, having also made the Last 4 at the Australian Open, Palermo, Olympics, and Beijing.
In their first meeting this season, Zheng improved to 3-0 against Paolini, having beaten the Italian twice last year in Palermo and Zhengzhou, where, in both instances, the Chinese went on to win the title.
In front of a full crowd on Friday night, Zheng improved to a tour-leading 18-3 in 3-setters with another gritty effort.
After splitting the first two sets, Zheng and Paolini matched each other from the baseline, Paolini locking down her game and using the slower hard court to her advantage to force the decider, and teasing errors out of the bigger-hitting 5th seed.
They exchanged holds for 7 consecutive games before the Chinese No 1 broke through, opening up the 4-3 game with a curling forehand winner, and earning triple break point with another series of violent topspin forehands.
She blistered a forehand return to seal her first break since the first game of the second set, and served out the win.
“She indeed played very well,” Zheng said afterwards. “It was an excellent match. Very sharp forehand from her. In terms of rallies, she played really, really excellent. I did very well in the key points. In her service games, I had more break points. She did not get as many break points as I did.”
Trying to become the first Chinese woman to qualify for the WTA Finals since Li Na in 2013, Zheng entered the Asian swing at No 9 on the PIF Race to the WTA Finals Leaderboard, and she leaves Wuhan at No 7, overtaking Emma Navarro to sit…
