By Chris Oddo | Friday March 16, 2018
Naomi Osaka notched her first win over a reigning No.1 by shellacking Simona Halep to reach the Indian Wells final.
Photo Source: Dan Huerlimann/Beelde Images
It will be a battle of 20-year-olds in the BNP Paribas Open final.
More: Kasatkina Edges Venus Williams to Reach Biggest Career Final
Japan’s Naomi Osaka trounced a dispassionate Simona Halep, 6-3, 6-0, to become the lowest-ranked women’s singles finalist at the BNP Paribas Open in 13 years. The victory sets a clash with Russia’s Daria Kasatkina, who earlier outlasted Venus Williams, 4-6, 6-4, 7-5.
Osaka entered the evening with an 0-3 lifetime record against the World No.1, including a recent straight-sets defeat to Halep at the Australian Open, and the match started innocently enough with the pair trading breaks and level at 3-all in the first set. But after Osaka held for 4-3, Halep failed to convert three game points for 4-all and never looked the same after.
Halep finished with 27 unforced errors against 16 winners, and she was impatient and never really engaged for much of the contest as the 20-year-old rolled through the final nine games to close affairs in 63 minutes.
During an on-court coaching session with Darren Cahill at 0-3 in the second set, Halep sat and stared into space while the Aussie urged his charge to stop littering up the stat sheet. But the conversation had little effect. Halep kept rushing through points—on occasion she’d produce a few brilliant winners but always the errors crept back in.
It was strange to see, because Halep has been involved in so many intense struggles this season, we've been accustomed to seeing her battle through adversity.
But not on this night.
Meanwhile Osaka kept cruising, making powerful returns and taking everything Halep gave her. The 20-year-old won 23 of 41 return points and broke serve five times on seven opportunities.
“I just really tried to be consistent,” she said. “I think in Australia I just made way too many mistakes, and I sort of handed her the match. So I just tried to be a little bit annoying and return a lot.”
Osaka has been magnificent all week, starting with an upset of Maria Sharapova and continuing on to notch wins over Agnieszka Radwanska, Sachia Vickery, Maria Sakkari and No.5-seeded Karolina Pliskova. She improves to 12-4 on the season and 8-1 lifetime at Indian Wells.
In her last two matches Osaka has matched and topped her biggest career win by ranking, and notched back-to-back Top 5 wins for the first time.
Osaka and Kasatkina will meet for the first time on Sunday. It promises to be an interesting matchup between Osaka’s power and booming serve and Kasatkina’s guile, touch and variety.
“I feel like it's going to be really interesting, because she kind of plays a completely different game than me, and I think we're both in the final of this type of tournament for the first time,” Osaka said. “So it's going to be fun, I think.”