No pressure for Simona Halep ahead of title match vs Sloane Stephens

Garbine Muguruza annihilated the former world number one Maria Sharapova 6-2 6-1 on Wednesday to reach the French Open semi-finals.

It will be Halep’s second consecutive Grand Slam final and her fourth overall attempt to win her first title in a major.

Despite being the number one seed, the Romanian Halep has yet to win a Grand Slam title having also lost this year’s Australian Open final to Caroline Wozniacki in January. And I think we played many matches.

“I will put everything I have Saturday on the court”.

“That’s the easiest way to compete, when you’re not thinking about too many things. So maybe I will have enough power to win it”.

Sharapova looked the more rusty of the two players, with two limp service games handing Muguruza an immediate 4-0 lead and consequently the first set.

“I think it would be odd for me not to include someone that I have competed against for so many years”, Sharapova said. “You know, I was, like, ‘Oh, OK.’ I didn’t expect to be reading a book about me that wasn’t necessarily true”.

Backed by fans who loudly chanted her first name between games, Halep went ahead 3-0 in only 15 minutes with the help of only one victor. “Let’s talk outside. It’s attractive weather”.

Indeed, her Roland Garros campaign this year came close to ending in the third round when Italy’s Camila Giorgi twice served for the match and was within two points of winning. The world No. 1 then closed out what I would consider the biggest win of her career. “I think there are a lot of good things like the way my body has handled the long matches that I have played, the back-to-backs”. She is less comfortable on the clay compared to Stephens and can get rattled when opponents make her run too much. “And now she says it”, said 1978 French Open champion Virginia Ruzici, who is Halep’s manager and the only woman from Romania to collect a major title.

“It’s Simona’s third final in Roland Garros, she has a great level. I believe that I have the game to win the match”.

The Simona Halep vs Sloane Stephens French Open women’s singles final will be played on the Philippe-Chatrier court in Paris.

What TV channel is it on? Her outlook in general resembles that of someone who is playing with house money. Halep has won 12 of her last 14 matches on clay court. She’s very relaxed about her career. The question was which dominant opponent would be waiting for her. Prediction: “Halep in two sets”. But before that, we are not going to be weird and awkward and make it, like, weird for each other.

As in NY nine months ago, it was a mistake-riddled performance from Keys, who committed 41 unforced errors to Stephens’ 11.

Halep had a relatively poor quarterfinal match against Angelique Kerber, racking up an uncharacteristic 46 errors, which is something Stephens could try to capitalize on. Stephens closed in on her second Grand Slam title by beating pal Madison Keys 6-4, 6-4 on Thursday in the first all-American semifinal at the French Open since 2002. Stephens has made the second week in Paris in five of her seven appearances and Keys is slowly coming to terms with the surface.

There was a stretch after winning the U.S. Open that Stephens did not manage to do that.

Muguruza has not dropped a set in this year’s tournament and dominated Sharapova with booming groundstrokes and superb returning that earned six breaks.

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