By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Wednesday January 24, 2024
China's Zheng Qinwen rallied for a three-set victory against Anna Kalinskaya to reach her maiden Slam semifinal.
Photo Source: Getty
In a year that marks the 10-year anniversary of Li Na’s stunning title round in Melbourne, Zheng Qinwen is emerging as the next great Chinese star. Li famously won the title in Melbourne in 2014, becoming the tournament’s first Chinese champion – now Zheng is two matches from following in her footsteps.
The 21-year-old powered past Russia’s Anna Kalinskaya 6-7(6), 6-3, 6-1 on Wednesday night in Melbourne to move into her first Grand Slam semifinal, setting a clash with Ukrainian qualifier Dayana Yastremska, the World No.93, for a spot in the final on Thursday.
Zheng and Yastremska, who became the first women's singles qualifier to reach the semifinals at Melbourne since 1978 earlier on Wednesday, have never met before on tour.
Zheng, playing in her ninth main draw at a major, kept her composure and dealt with the pressures of being a heavy favorite against the 75th-ranked Russian to become the third player from China to reach the Australian Open semifinal in the Open Era, and the youngest Chinese to ever achieve the feat.
Kalinskaya, who entered this year’s Australian Open with a 4-13 lifetime record at the majors before improbably reeling off four consecutive victories and dropping just one set in the process, claimed a high quality first set in a tiebreak. The set featured two trades of breaks, but very little in the way of nerves from either player. Both struck the ball cleanly, ripped groundstrokes with authority and were willing to take their backhand down the line to finish points.
Kalinskaya hit on 82 percent of her first serves in the first set and converted her first set point, impressively ripping a second-serve backhand return down the line for a clean winner.
But Zheng didn’t hang her head.
The Beijing native was flawless in the second set, never facing a break point and breaking for 5-3 before closing out the set with an ace in the next game.
The momentum stayed with Zheng in the decider as she notched consecutive breaks and reeled off five consecutive games from 0-1 to take a commanding 5-1 lead.
She promptly served out the match in the next game, finishing the deciding set with 13 winners against five unforced errors, and three break points converted from three opportunities.
The No.12 seed finished the match by winning nine of the final ten games to improve to 1-1 lifetime against the 25-year-old Russian.
For the match, Zheng cracked 42 winners against 35 unforced errors; Kalinskaya hit 18 winners against 30 unforced errors. Zheng improves to 3-7 at the majors when dropping the opening set, and 19-8 lifetime at the majors. Though it has been an incredible run for Zheng, she has benefitted from the draw gods as well – she has yet to face a Top 50 player and has faced players with an average ranking of 78.8.
In a year that marks the 10-year anniversary of Li Na’s stunning title round in Melbourne, Zheng is emerging as the next great Chinese star. Li famously won the title in Melbourne in 2014, becoming the tournament’s first Chinese champion – now Zheng is two matches from following in her footsteps.
China’s Zheng Qinwen powered past Russia’s Anna Kalinskaya 6-7(6), 6-3, 6-1 on Wednesday night in Melbourne to move into her first Grand Slam semifinal. The 21-year-old No.12 seed will face Ukrainian qualifier Dayana Yastremska, the World No.93, for a spot in the final on Thursday.
The pair have never met before on tour.
Zheng, playing in her ninth main draw at a major, kept her composure and dealt with the pressures of being a heavy favorite against the 75th-ranked Russian to become the third player from China to reach the Australian Open semifinal in the Open Era, and the youngest Chinese to ever achieve the feat.
Kalinskaya, who entered this year’s Australian Open with a 4-13 lifetime record at the majors before reeling off four consecutive victories and dropping just one set in the process, claimed a high quality first set in a tiebreak. The set featured two trades of breaks, but very little in the way of nerves from either player. Both struck the ball cleanly, and were willing to take their backhand down the line to finish points.
Kalinskaya hit on 82 percent of her first serves in the first set and converted her first set point of the set, impressively ripping a second-serve backhand return down the line for a clean winner.
But Zheng didn’t hang her head.
The Beijing native was flawless in the second set, never facing a break point and breaking for 5-3 before closing out the set with an ace in the next game.
The momentum stayed with Zheng in the decider as she notched consecutive breaks and reeled off five consecutive games from 0-1 to take a commanding 5-1 lead.
She promptly served out the match in the next game, finishing the deciding set with 13 winners against five unforced errors, and three break points converted from three opportunities.
She finished the match by winning nine of the final ten games to improve to 1-1 lifetime against the 25-year-old Russian.
For the match, Zheng cracked 42 winners against 35 unforced errors; Kalinskaya hit 18 winners against 30 unforced errors. Zheng improves to 3-7 at the majors when dropping the opening set, and 19-8 lifetime at the majors. Though it has been an incredible run for Zheng, she has benefitted from the draw gods as well – she has yet to face a Top 50 player and has faced players with an average ranking of 78.8.
Regardless of the result in Thursday’s semifinal, Zheng will make her Top 10 debut after the Australian Open, joining Li as the second Chinese women to ever hold that distinction.
Regardless of the result in Thursday’s semifinal, Zheng will make her Top 10 debut after the Australian Open, joining Li as the second Chinese women to ever hold that distinction.