American fourth seed Sofia Kenin beat Czech seventh seed Petra Kvitova 6-4 7-5 for the first time in their three career meetings to advance to the final of the 2020 French Open.
In the first set, the 21-year-old Kenin’s early double break lead, 4-1, proved to be insurmountable for the 30-year-old Kvitova.
The second set was also dictated by Kenin, but Kvitova stayed competitive till the end. As Kenin was serving for the match, the two-time Wimbledon winner broke back to level to 5-5. After dropping serve once again, Kvitova did earn another break point to force a tiebreak, but Kenin fought it off and held serve to advance to the second Grand Slam final of her career.
Prior to 2020 Roland Garros, the reigning Australian Open champion Kenin had never reached a WTA quarterfinal on clay, with her best result on the surface being last year’s run to the fourth round in Paris.
Kenin’s opponent in the title match will be Polish 19-year-old Iga Swiatek, who recorded yet another super solid victory this fortnight by beating fellow unseeded semifinalist Nadia Podoroska earlier on Thursday on Court Philippe Chatrier.
