Halep and Bouchard Roll Into Semifinals
The final four in the women’s draw at Wimbledon is all set after the last two quarterfinal matches wrapped up Wednesday as Simona Halep and Eugenie Bouchard pushed their way into the semifinals at the All-England Club.
Bouchard knocked off German Angelique Kerber 6-3, 6-4, a day after Kerber took down Maria Sharapova. The key to the match came in the first set when the two were deadlocked at 3-3. The 20-year old Canadian faced four break points while serving, but was able to save them all as she pulled out the game that lasted nearly 10 minutes.
From there, Bouchard would reel off the next two games to capture the opening set. Both players would exchange holds in the second set, and a late break point allowed Bouchard to close out Kerber and claim the straight set victory in just over an hour.
“I’m happy to be able to pull it out in the end,” said Bouchard. “I was really trying to stay in the moment and knew I couldn’t think ahead. At the end, I had a few bad errors but also a few good, aggressive shots.”
Bouchard did have 20 unforced errors, but made up for it with 29 winners and four aces. She has now reached the semifinals in each of her last three Grand Slams, and will meet the third-seeded Halep for a spot in the title match.
The Romanian Halep cruised to the 6-4, 6-0 victory over Germany’s Sabine Lisicki in less than an hour, but it did not look that way in the beginning. Halep fell behind last year’s runner up 4-1 in the first set, but then rattled off 11 straight games to steam roll into the semifinals.
She picked up five break points to turn the tides in the match, and used a masterful serve to take points on 80 percent of her first serves. Halep, who lost to Sharapova in this year’s French Open, will look to reach back-to-back Grand Slam finals when she faces Bouchard.
Lucie Safarova will take on the 2011 Champion Petra Kvitova in the other semifinal match which will be an all-Czech Republic affair.
