We had a couple of very fast semifinals in Paris on Friday.
Sara Errani took advantage of a retiring Bertens that was forced to retire because of a back pain when she was 5-0 down after 24 minutes. It was a pity as the Dutch was playing an incredible tournament as she accessed the main draw as a lucky loser to upset Cibulkova and Safarova in straight sets.
Sara had a strange tournament so far as she reached the final by playing only one full match. In fact, after the first round bye, she played in the second round qualifier Rybarikova that retired when she was 4-0 down after 28 minutes. Then the Italian had an epic 3 hours victory against Carla Suarez Navarro to then benefit from Bertens’ retirement in the semifinal.
Errani will face Mona Barthel. The 22 years-old from Germany confirms to be a terrible customer on indoor hard courts to defeat Kristina Mladenovic 6-1-6-4 in the semifinal after having upset seed no.5 Roberta Vinci and home favorite Marion Bartoli in the quarterfinals.
This will be the first match between Errani and Barthel. The Italian seems to be the favorite, but we would not write off Mona… not at all!
Interview from Mona
