Key events
Preamble
Good morning and welcome to Roland-Garros 2023 – day 9!
After a week and a bit of premier jousting, the real gear gets under way this morning with the start of our quarter-finals, and naturellement there’s plenty to go at plenty at which to go.
We begin with an unseeded battle, Karolina Muchová taking on Anastasia Pavlyuchenko. The former has done nicely out of a fine first-round dismissal of Maria Sakkari, snaffling the number eight seed’s pleasant path through the draw. As the better athlete with the bigger weapons, she’s the favourite to progress, but her opponent has dismissed the more taxing roster, so is also in excellent nick.
Following that we’ve a belter of a match. Elina Svitolina is one of the feel-good stories of the fortnight, having recently returned from injury and maternity to rediscover her best form. But if she’s to progress any further she’ll probably need to play better than she ever has before, because Aryna Sabalenka is no longer the talent who conjures new and exciting ways to lose but a grand slam champion hungry for more and in her absolute prime. She may, of course, be affected by the political furore around her – tired of being asked questions about Belarus’ support of Russia, she’s stopped attending press conferences to protect herself – or it may fire her to greater heights. We shall see.
And finally, we’ll bring you Novak Djokovic’s tussle with Karen Khachanov. On the face of things, it looks a gimme for the goat – I can’t decide whether I just like the alliteration or if I genuinely believe him to be the best ever – but he can sometimes things difficult for himself. Khachanov, meanwhile, has grown into a far more confident player over the last year or so, and is aiming for a third straight major semi. He believes he can do it, and that makes him dangerous.
Donc, on y va!