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Alexander Zverev rolled into the French Open semi-finals a year after leaving the grand slam in a wheelchair and said his injury issues in the last 12 months made his achievement a little sweeter.
Zverev was in excruciating pain after suffering a serious ankle injury during his Roland Garros semi-final against Rafa Nadal in 2022 and had surgery to repair his ligaments.
The German’s return was further delayed in September due to a bone edema issue and he only began playing pain-free earlier this season.
Zverev showed glimpses of his peak form on Wednesday as he beat unseeded Argentine Tomas Martin Etcheverry 6-4 3-6 6-3 6-4 in the quarter-finals and the 22nd seed said the agony of last year was not on his mind anymore.
He will face Norway’s Casper Ruud after he outlasted Denmark’s Holger Rune 6-1 6-2 3-6 6-3.
“I don’t think about it. I’m going on court to win tennis matches. I’m not thinking about what happened last year. I have to talk about it a lot obviously, that’s fine,” Zverev said.
“That’s everybody’s job, but I’m here to win tennis matches. I’m here to go deep in a grand slam.
“Grand slams are tennis history. That’s what you play for. I think the two most important things in tennis are grand slams and the Olympic Games.
“When you’re in a semi-final or final of either of those, I think that’s very different than being in a final of another tournament.”
Zverev said Roland Garros was a tournament he increasingly looked forward to as his comeback gathered pace.
“I’m happy to be playing the way I’m playing here in Paris,” the 26-year-old said. “I’m extremely happy with how things are going, but the tournament is not over yet.
“There are still potentially two very difficult matches ahead, and I’m looking forward to that.”
Top-ranked Iga Swiatek kept her French Open title defence on track with a 6-4 6-2 victory over Coco Gauff to reach the semifinals.
In a rematch of last year’s final, Swiatek recorded another straight-set victory over the American and will next face Beatriz Haddad Maia on Thursday as she chases her third trophy at the clay-court major.
The 19-year-old Gauff fell to 0-7 against Swiatek, and the Floridian has yet to take a set against her. Swiatek, a 22-year-old Pole, won 6-1 6-3 in last year’s final.
“Quarterfinals are sometimes the toughest matches,” Swiatek said on Court Philippe Chatrier after her win. “Even though she’s young, she’s experienced. I’m pretty happy to be in the semifinal.”
The match was much closer than last year’s final, but Swiatek was in control throughout, breaking Gauff to love to seal the first set and converting on four of five break opportunities overall.
Gauff had said this was the match she wanted, reasoning that “if you want to be the best, you have to beat the best.” But the American finished with 13 winners and 23 unforced errors.
Earlier on Chatrier, Haddad Maia scored another comeback win, upsetting Ons Jabeur 3-6 7-6 (5) 6-1 to become the first Brazilian woman since 1968 to reach a grand slam semifinal.
The 14th-seeded Haddad Maia, who served a 10-month suspension for failing a doping test in 2019, shook off a slow start against the seventh-seeded Jabeur.
After playing nearly four hours to beat Sara Sorribes Tormo in the fourth round, Haddad Maia won only one of her service games in the first set. But she saved the only two break points she faced in the second set – both in the 11th game to go up 6-5 – and won the tiebreaker.
The 27-year-old Brazilian started the deciding set with a double break and a 3-0 lead. A frustrated Jabeur flipped her racket in the air after sending an easy backhand wide on a break-point opportunity while down 4-1. Haddad Maia won the game and served out the match, putting her hand on her cap almost in disbelief after Jabeur sailed a forehand long on the second match point.
“I had to be patient. She’s one of the best players in the world,” Haddad Maia said on court. “Not easy to play against her. She’s tricky sometimes.”
Jabeur, a Tunisian who was the runner-up at Wimbledon and the US Open last year, used drop shots effectively early in the match but in the end had more unforced errors (42) than winners (38).
“I always believed that the match (would be) long,” Haddad Maia said. “That was the key. I was trying to keep my game.”
Haddad Maia is the first Brazilian woman to reach the semifinals at Roland Garros in the Open era. Maria Bueno reached the last four at the 1966 French Open and made the 1968 US Open semifinals.
Haddad Maia’s fourth-round win over Sorribes Tormo, 6-7 (3), 6-3, 7-5, was the longest WTA match of the year – clocking in a 3 hours, 51 minutes.
After failing her doping test in 2019, the Brazilian player had argued that she had merely been taking supplements. The International Tennis Federation accepted Haddad Maia’s explanation and said she “bore no significant fault or negligence for her violation,” but that a suspension was nonetheless mandatory.
Jabeur, whose preparations for the tournament were slowed by a calf injury, said she “wasn’t expecting to be in the quarterfinals, especially this is kind of my first tournament after being injured.”
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