Among the many astonishing facets of Simona Halep’s quarter-final performance against Shuai Zhang was that the Romanian had no need to call the trainer for attention to her right thigh.
Countless times in this toughest of matches, Halep bashed her own hand against her leg as much in frustration as in encouragement – and ultimately, it worked. With all her signature fight to the fore, the No.7 seed edged an epic first set and then steamrollered the second.
Zhang’s display belied both her world No.50 ranking and the fact that she had never won a Wimbledon match in five attempts before this campaign; but having surrendered that first set, she was powerless. In front of a riveted crowd on No.1 Court, Halep prevailed 7-6(4), 6-1 to reach the semi-finals here for the first time since 2014.
“I definitely fought hard in the first set,” Halep told the BBC with satisfaction. “I knew she would come and hit with a lot of power. I knew I had to play aggressive as much as possible and be strong, and I did great. I feel fresh, healthy and confident, and I’m playing my best tennis on grass.”
She’s not wrong there. Since breaking her Grand Slam duck to capture Roland-Garros last year, Halep has had the look of a player whose odyssey is complete. Amid the wide-open women’s field, no one tipped her for the title before The Championships began.
Meanwhile, what an astonishing Wimbledon this has been for Zhang, and how fitting that this key match should have been against Halep.
The Chinese captured her maiden Grand Slam match win as a qualifier at the Australian Open in 2016, having lost all 14 of her previous main draw matches in a wretched run stretching back to 2008. The player she defeated to snap that losing streak was Halep, then the world No.2, and Zhang went on to reach the quarter-finals that year in Melbourne. But it has been a chequered path for her since.
Even so, last year she announced to family and friends: “I am going to win a Grand Slam title in 2019” – and so she has, capturing the doubles with Samantha Stosur at the Australian Open.
Coming in to this singles quarter-final, her impressive roll call of scalps had already included ex-top five player (and a good mate) Caroline Garcia, the former US Open semi-finalist Yanina Wickmayer, the former world No.1 Caroline Wozniacki and the fast-rising Ukrainian teenager Dayana Yastremska.
As soon as the match began, it was evident that Zhang’s success here was no fluke. The work rate, the intensity, the quality – it was all here from both players, but Zhang was out of the gate like a rocket, breaking at once in a display of utter confidence and composure.
Pushing the ball as deep and as wide as the limits would allow, she was nervelessly focused as she dictated the play. Amid rallies routinely over ten strokes, she leapt out to a 4-1 advantage. Four times already this year Halep had lost to players ranked outside the top 30. Would this be number five?
But there are times in tennis when one mini-chapter or another has Big Game written all over it, and game six in the first set was that mini-chapter. It was ten minutes on which so much hinged.
Four times Zhang had break point for 5-1, to serve for the first set; but all Halep’s fighting qualities saw her hang on. It gave her a toehold on the cliff-face, and from there the Romanian hauled herself onward. She began to have a say in the shape of the rallies, although it was draining toil and her audible frustration was evident more than once.
But by the time they arrived in the tie-break, errors were blotting Zhang’s spectacular stroke play. The intensity was as high as ever, along with the extraordinary mutual work rate, but a forehand mistake from Zhang brought up two hard-earned set points for Halep, who needed only one.
Where that first set required almost an hour, the second chapter was barely half as long. Zhang could not bounce back from the grievous reverse of the opener. Moreover, the second set was a reminder that Halep came into this quarter-final leading the remaining eight players on percentage of return games won (55%). With her own serve now all but untouchable, she broke for 2-1 and the writing was on the wall.
At the net, the two women met with smiles and enormous mutual respect. Zhang will re-enter the top 40 as a result of her travails here, and must surely be targeting a return to her career high of 23 in 2016. As for Halep, this is her deepest Grand Slam progress since she lifted the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen last summer. The biggest fighter in tennis is in the house, and she isn’t done yet at Wimbledon 2019.
