Seventh seed Julia Goerges needed to win just one set on Friday to get on top of the Azalea Group, but the German crushed top seed Kristina Mladenovic 6-2 7-6(4) and joined Ashleigh Barty, Anastasija Sevastova and Coco Vandeweghe in the semifinals of the Hengqin Life WTA Elite Trophy Zhuhai.
With her Moscow title, Goerges is now on a seven-match winning streak, while Mladenovic is finishing her overall successful season with 12 consecutive losses. In today’s match, the world No.10 Mladenovic made nine double faults, while her other stats were just as weak, especially the 23% of points won on second serve.
In two dead rubbers that followed on Friday, Elena Vesnina retired while trailing Peng Shuai 6-2 1-0 in the Bougainvillea Group, while US Open champion Sloane Stephens lost the first five games of her match against Barbora Strycova in the Camellia Group and then retired.
In Saturday’s Zhuhai semifinals, Goerges’ opponent will be Sevastova, while Vandeweghe will take on Barty.
I’m so proud of Jule. She managed to do well in this tournament without dropping any set.
Emman Damian, and not only that she won the title without dropping a set, she also had her serve broken only a few times.