Swiss tennis shows no feet of clay in Paris
Switzerland has been well-served by tennis stars in recent years. This week, at the French Open at Roland-Garros, the trend continues.
The presence of Stan Wawrinka in Friday’s semi-final against world number one Andy Murray is not a huge surprise: the Lausanne-born player is ranked third in the world and has won three grand slam titles in recent years, including the US Open in 2016.
On Thursday, Timea Bacsinszky, also from Lausanne, contested a semi-final against Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko. In reaching this stage, Bacsinszky, the 30th seed, has equalled her best ever Grand Slam performance.
Not only this, but Bacsinszky celebrated her 28th birthday on court – a coincidence made even more startling by the fact that her unseeded Latvian opponent also celebrated her birthday, her 20th.
Bacsinszky was defeated in the third set, but if both Swiss players had qualified it would have been the first time that the country had a representative in both male and female finals of a Grand Slam tournament.
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