Just semi-teen! Andreeva stuns Paris

PARIS — With the insouciance of a 17-year-old having the time of her life in Paris, Mirra Andreeva says that she and her coach work out a game plan before a tennis match — and then she forgets all about that, preferring to just wing it.

Well, it seems to be working out fine so far: The unseeded Russian is the youngest Grand Slam semifinalist in more than a quarter of a century.

Playing in only her sixth major tournament, Andreeva got past an ill No 2 seed Aryna Sabalenka 6-7(5), 6-4, 6-4 at the French Open on Wednesday. Next, on Thursday, Andreeva goes up against an equally surprising opponent: No 12 Jasmine Paolini, a 28-year-old Italian who reached her first major semifinal by defeating No 4 Elena Rybakina 6-2,4-6, 6-4.

"I always play the way I want to play. We have a plan with my coach for the match, but afterward, I forget everything, and when I play, I don't have any thoughts in my head," said the 38th-ranked Andreeva, who is based in Cannes and coached by 1994 Wimbledon champion Conchita Martinez. "So, maybe I would say that my strength could be that I just play how I want to play and I do whatever I want to do."

Words that will carry a familiar ring for most parents with teenagers at home.

The other matchup Thursday will be No 1 Iga Swiatek against No 3 Coco Gauff. Swiatek is seeking her fifth Grand Slam title and fourth in Paris; Gauff won the US Open last September and was the runner-up to Swiatek at Roland Garros in 2022.They both won their respective singles quarterfinals on Tuesday.

Gauff, with Katerina Siniakova, and Paolini, with Sara Errani, are also into the semifinals in doubles; Andreeva withdrew from that event before her quarterfinal on Wednesday.

Andreeva's success at her age is not unprecedented, but it's been a while.

She is the youngest Grand Slam semifinalist since Martina Hingis at age 16 in 1997. You need to go even further back to find a younger player who eliminated a woman ranked No 1 or 2 at Roland Garros: In 1990 Monica Seles — who, like Hingis, is a member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame — was 16 when she beat Steffi Graf in the final.

"I would say that I am almost like a normal teenager, because I still have to do my schoolwork, which I don't like to do. I watch a lot of TV series in my spare time. I watch Netflix. I sometimes spend too much time on Instagram," Andreeva said. "But, maybe what makes me a little different is that, I don't know if I can say that I'm mature, but I feel in myself that I'm a mature person, and I feel that I know what I'm doing."

So, even if she and Martinez go over a strategy ahead of time, those tactics are not necessarily implemented.

According to Andreeva, whose 19-year-old sister, Erika, lost to Sabalenka in the first round last week, she figures things out from shot to shot.

She explained: "I decide what I should do. Should I go down the line or should I do cross? Should I do a drop shot? Should I do a lob?'"

"Sometimes, that's not really good, because I have a lot of decisions to make in my mind."

She has yet to win a tour-level title of any sort, and is competing in only her fifth Slam tournament.

Sabalenka, meanwhile, is a two-time champion at the Australian Open, including in January, and had won the first 23 Grand Slam sets she played in 2024, until dropping two in a row against Andreeva. Dealing with a stomach illness, Sabalenka was visited multiple times by a trainer and doctor, and could often be seen clutching at her midsection.

There were plenty of momentum shifts, and the outcome felt in doubt until the very last game, when Andreeva broke with a beautiful lob that Sabalenka didn't even attempt to get to.

"If we look back," Andreeva said later. "I wouldn't expect myself to be (in the) semifinals."

Had Sabalenka and Rybakina won, this would have been only the second time in the professional era, which began in 1968, that the women seeded 1-4 all advanced to the semifinals in Paris. The other was way back in 1992. But Paolini and Andreeva prevented that.

With Jannik Sinner into the men's semifinals, it is the first time an Italian woman and Italian man have both appeared in the final four at the same Grand Slam tournament in the same year. It's quite a moment for their country in tennis: On Monday, Sinner will become the first Italian man to reach No 1 in the ATP world rankings.

The men's semifinals are Friday, when Sinner will play Carlos Alcaraz, and Alexander Zverev will take on Casper Ruud. Zverev reached the final four in Paris for the fourth consecutive year, beating Alex de Minaur 6-4, 7-6 (5), 6-4 at night.

The fourth-seeded Zverev is competing in Paris as a court proceeding continues in his home country of Germany, connected to accusations of physical abuse by a former girlfriend of his.

Zverev said he never thought it was a possibility he wouldn't be able to play in the French Open because of the court case.

"They made it very clear from the beginning that I don't have to be there. I think everything is going accordingly. Everything is going OK from my side and from my point of view," he said. "There's nothing else to say."

Paolini exited in either the first or second rounds in her first 16 Grand Slam appearances, before making it to the fourth round of the Australian Open. Now she's made it two steps beyond that.

For Paolini, Thursday is a chance for a rematch against Andreeva, who is more than a decade younger but won their meeting last month at the Madrid Open on clay.

"She's so young, but she's so, so good mentally. And she can defend very well. She can serve well," Paolini said. "It's going to be a tough match, but we are in the semifinals, so there are no easy matches."

Agencies via Xinhua