In the opening set of the Hamburg Open quarterfinal match between Paula Badosa and Mayar Sherif, neither player appeared capable of taking control for long. When one player would get a break, the other would break back, and each game lasted a seeming eternity.
In fact, one game alone midway through the first set was 20 minutes long. The entire set took an hour and a half to play, and, of course, ended in a tie-break after the set had seen six breaks of serve. The last came with Sherif trying to serve the set out, but she at least took full control of the tie-break initially. She led 5-1 before a mini-comeback by Badosa fell short, and Sherif had the advantage.
Even then, not for long. In the opening game of the second set, Badosa got a break, but as with the first set, Sherif got the break straight back. The match had turned into a battle of who could give the result away less.
Mayar Sherif's biggest Hamburg moment came at Paula Badosa's expense
In the first set, the Spaniard was the far more aggressive player and got 25 winners and 22 unforced errors, while the Egyptian had 16 and eight, respectively. What seemed to get Badosa in the most trouble was her serve. She had two aces, but seven double faults. All those free points for her opponent were haunting her, and doing so again at the start of set two.
And yet, even while not committing as many double faults and landing her first serve far more, Sherif couldn't hold easily, either. It was as if both players were trying to just push through the service games to be able to tee off on the serve of the other. The match was a strange one. Not unexpectedly, in the third game of the second set, Badosa broke again to get to 2-1.
The players had met three times before, but only every few years until recently. In the final of this July's Iasi Open, Sherif had defeated Badosa, but the Spaniard was also dealing with a stomach issue that forced her to retire in the second set. In other words, the quarterfinal match of the Hamburg Open was unfolding as if the players weren't overly familiar with one another. It didn't make for pretty tennis.
After a stretch of holds by both players, Badosa appeared to tire and dropped serve leading 5-4. Attempting to hold at 5-6, the Spaniard missed the first point and bent over, appearing to be drained emotionally and crying into her hand. To her credit, though, she held and then won the tie-break to force a third set. It was a brilliant moment of mental toughness by Badosa.
By the time the third set started after Sherif took a long break between sets, the match was trending toward being the longest of the year. The first two sets had taken two hours and 40 minutes. Whoever won might be physically wiped for the semifinals on Saturday.
The third set was no different than the first two in terms of the back-and-forth drama. Sherif jumped out to a 4-1 and double-break lead, but, of course, Paula Badosa was able to get back to 4-all and on serve. Yet, the Spaniard, still trying to hold herself together emotionally, was broken, and all Sherif needed to do was hold serve to take the set 6-4 and the match along with it.
Almost stunningly, Sherif was able to hold. She won the match in three hours and 27 minutes, five minutes short of the longest match of the year. She has now won 13 straight matches.
Mayar Sherif will next play the winner of the Tamara Korpatsch and Anhelina Kalinina match in the semifinals. The other semi will feature Elina Avanesyan against Anna Bondar. The final will take place on Sunday.
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