Crowd serve up more Elina boos
ELINA Svitolina was booed again by the French Open crowd after her memorable Paris run was ended by Aryna Sabalenka in the quarterfinals.
In her first grand slam since the birth of daughter Skai last October, the Ukrainian has enjoyed one of her best grand slams but Australian Open champion Sabalenka was too strong in a 6-4 6-4 victory.
Having hit away the winning forehand, Belarusian Sabalenka stood at the net waiting for a handshake she must have known would not come, and there were loud boos as Svitolina walked straight past her.
The 28-year-old had received loud support during the match but she left Philippe Chatrier to a mixture of jeers and cheers. Svitolina had beaten two consecutive Russian opponents, both times offering a thumbs-up at the end, but this was probably the highest-profile sporting clash between competitors from opposing sides of the war since it began.
Sabalenka will now face unseeded Karolina Muchova, who earlier defeated Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 7-5 6-2 to reach her second grand slam semi-final.
Novak Djokovic lost his first set of the French Open but battled back to defeat Karen Khachanov and move through to the semi-finals.
The third seed looked like he could be in trouble when he was pushed to a second-set tie-break after dropping the opener but he won seven straight points and pulled away to win 4-6 7-6 (0) 6-2 6-4.
Top seeds Neal Skupski and Wesley Koolhof were beaten in the men’s doubles quarter-finals by Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos for the second year in a row.
British star Skupski and Dutchman Koolhof have established themselves as the best pair in the world over the past 18 months but are yet to win a grand slam title together as they succumbed to a 6-3 7-6 (4) defeat.
Meanwhile, British teenager Isabelle Lacy claimed the biggest win of her fledgling career by knocking out third seed Madison Brengle at the Lexus Surbiton Trophy.
The 16-year-old came through qualifying and overcame a rankings gap of more than 750 places to see off American Brengle 7-6 (2) 5-7 6-1.
Birmingham’s Dan Evans took a wild card into the men’s event after his first-round loss at the French Open and joined Andy Murray in round two with a 6-4 6-4 victory over Australian James Mccabe.
Katie Boulter and Katie Swan were both convincing winners on the women’s side – Boulter beating Olivia Gadecki, of Australia, 6-2 6-1 while Swan saw off Canada’s Carol Zhao 6-2 6-0. Eden Silva and Sonay Kartal also reached round two but Heather Watson was edged out 2-6 7-6 (3) 7-6 (6) by Australian Maddison Inglis.