The Malta Independent on Sunday
Nadal gets his revenge over Tsitsipas to reach Rome final
Tennis
scene in 2004. His last trophy came in Toronto last August.
The crowd attempted to encourage Tsitsipas with chants of “Tsi-Tsi-Tsi; Pas-Pas-Pas” but the 20-year-old Greek player couldn’t keep up with Nadal on the long rallies – even though he didn’t play a day earlier after Roger Federer withdrew from the quarterfinals.
Conditions were much slower than on the high-altitude court in Madrid, which favored Nadal and made it tougher for Tsitsipas to execute his attacking game.
Midway through the first set, Nadal produced an awesome forehand winner up the line on the run, drawing a loud roar from the packed Campo Centrale crowd.
Nadal broke Tsitsipas’ serve early in both sets.
In the final, Nadal will be meeting the winner of the other semifinal between Novak Djokovic of Serbia and Diego Schwartzman of Argentina who were playing late yesterday evening.
In the women’s tournament, Johanna Konta rallied past sixthseeded Kiki Bertens 5-7, 7-5, 6-2 in nearly three hours to reach the biggest clay-court final of her career.
Karolina Pliskova beat Greek qualifier Maria Sakkari in the other semifinal, 6-4, 6-4.
Pliskova is having a solid year, having reached the Australian Open semifinals and the Miami Open final after opening the season with a title in Brisbane, Australia.
Konta’s only previous final on clay came recently in Rabat, Morocco, where she lost to Sakkari.
“I’ve never really doubted my ability on the surface,” Konta said. “I won a lot of my first junior titles, first professional titles on clay. I’ve always felt that I have a game that has the ability to do well on this surface.”
Midway through the first set, Konta surprised Bertens with a drop shot winner during a baseline rally, causing Bertens to fall on her stomach to the clay as she rapidly changed directions. Then in the next game, Konta ran down a drop shot and produced an angled winner.
Bertens was coming off the Madrid Open title.
“She played really smart with the drop shots,” Bertens said. “I was all the time getting myself together and trying to push for more energy. But it was not there.”
The 42nd-ranked Konta served for the first set at 5-4 but was broken at love. But Bertens double-faulted to let Konta serve for the second set and Konta got an early break in the third.