Nine wins, one door left open
On Thursday in Paris, Maja Chwalinska walked through a door no qualifier had ever opened. After defeating No. 25 seed Diana Shnaider 7-6 (4), 6-4 in 2 hours and 10 minutes, the 24-year-old became the first qualifier in tournament history to reach the final. It was her ninth consecutive win from the qualifying draw, and it carried her into a Grand Slam final against Mirra Andreeva.
The match was a study in contrast: her variety against Shnaider's power. Chwalinska struck first with a break at love for a 3-1 lead. But after a back-and-forth exchange of backhands, her slice drifted wide, handing Shnaider the break back for 3-2. The rallies stretched long. After 68 minutes, the set moved into a tiebreak. There, Chwalinska found her poise. Shnaider grabbed the mini-break on the opening point and built a 4-2 advantage, but Chwalinska reeled off five straight points, the penultimate one on a placed lob winner, before a Shnaider backhand landed wide. The opening set lasted 1 hour and 17 minutes, one minute longer than the entire Andreeva-Kostyuk semifinal.
The second set turned physical for both. Chwalinska grabbed at her heavily taped left leg and called for the physio, while a few games later Shnaider took a medical timeout for treatment around her lower back. The Pole held her nerve. After the players traded holds through 4-4, Chwalinska went to the well once more with a drop shot that secured the decisive break for 5-4, then served out the match with a backhand down the line and a forehand on the line. "All the kudos to Maja," Shnaider said in her post-match press conference. "She played amazing. It was a very hard battle."
