London [UK], July 11 : The number seven seed Jasmine Paolini advanced to the Wimbledon finals after defeating Donna Vekic in what turned out to be the longest semifinal in the tournament's history on Thursday.
Paolini defeated Vekic by 2-6, 6-4, 7-6[8] in a match that lasted for two hours and 51 minutes, becoming the first-ever Italian women to reach the finals of the competition in Open Era.
The previous longest Wimbledon semifinal was between Serena Williams, who won by 6-7(4), 7-5, 8-6 and Elena Dementieva in 2009.
The runners-up at Roland Garros just last month to Iga Swiatek, Paolini has reached her second major final, becoming first player since Serena in 2016 to reach the title clashes of French Open and Wimbledon within the same season. She is only the fifth player to have achieved this feat in past 25 years, including Stefanie Graf (1999), Serena Williams (2002, 2015, 2016), Venus Williams (2002) and Justine Henin (2006).
Paolini had held her first match point at 5-4 during the third set and second at 6-5. Later, she edged Vekic in a gripping tie-break to register her third win in four matches against Vekic, which came after withstanding 42 winners from the Croatian.
Having not won a grass match at tour-level ever before 2024, Paolini now has a record of eight wins and a loss on the surface, with a loss coming against Daria Kasatkina in the Eastbourne semifinals two weeks ago. With this move to finals, she is guaranteed to make her top five debut in WTA Rankings next week.
In her post-match interview, Paolini admitted that she struggled against the Croatian.
"She was playing unbelievable, she was hitting winners everywhere. I was struggling at the beginning. I told myself to fight for every ball and try to improve a little bit on the court, because I was serving really bad," she said as quoted by WTA website.
"This match I will remember forever," Paolini exclaimed.
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