2024 Roland Garros Women’s Final Preview:
Another year of Roland Garros is coming to an end. The women’s singles tournament has seen a near scare for the tournament favorite and the rise of up-and-coming superstars eventually has diminished a pool of 128 down to 2. One is a champion with hopes of constructing her growing legacy while her opponent hopes to build on what has been the best two weeks of her career.
Poland’s Iga Swiatek hopes to win her 4th French Open Title in six tournaments. While, Italy’s Jasmine Paolini hopes to cap her best grand slam performance of her career with a win against the back-to-back French Open champion.
Jasmine Paolini’s road to the Final ran into its first turbulence in the third round against former US Open Champion Bianca Andreescu. After dropping the second set, Paolini shut the door on the Canadian with a bagel 6-0 third set victory. The 4th seed of the tournament Elena Rybakina proved to be another test for Paolini, but the Italian came away with a three-set victory over the Wimbledon champion of 2022. The semifinals saw two superstars of tomorrow, 17-year-old Mirra Andreeva against Paolini, the Italian took command from start to finish. Jasmine Paolini cruised to her first grand slam singles final with a (6-3) (6-1) win. Paolini also is in the women’s doubles finals with fellow countrywoman Sara Errani. Paolini can be the first player since Barbora Krecjikova to win a title in both singles and doubles in Roland Garos in the same year.
For the defending back-to-back Roland Garros champion, Iga Swiatek, her quest for a three peat and a fifth grand slam championship encountered trouble against former World number one Naomi Osaka. After dropping the second set of her second-round match against Osaka, Swiatek rallied after down a match point to escape with a third set victory of 7-5 in what may have been the match of the tournament. Swiatek would go on a tear after the dangerous encounter with Osaka, dropping only eight games in three matches including trouncing last year’s Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova (6-0) (6-2). Swiatek in the semifinals continued her dominance against American Coco Gauff. Swiatek as she has done all tournament routinely won another trip to the French Open final with a (6-2) (6-4) win. Swiatek has won all four grand slam finals she’s played in three at Roland Garros and once at the US Open.
In their two previous meetings Swiatek won both matches only dropping three games, but the most recent encounter came in the US Open back in 2022, the tournament she would go on to win.
This match is an incredible opportunity for Jasmine Paolini, an opportunity to beat a champion who has been borderline unbeatable at Roland Garros. Paolini this year won her largest event with a Masters victory in Dubai, a master’s 1000 event. A win for Paolini would be one of the largest upsets in the French Open final in recent memory dating back to Jelena Ostapenko’s victory in 2017.
For Swiatek, a fourth French Open title would tie for 4th all time for female singles in Paris, which would pad an already truncated resume.
Pick: Swiatek (6-2) (6-1)
As exciting of a story, it would be for a close match, it seems difficult to see a way Paolini wins this match. Look for Iga to dictate play and force Paolini to play defense, right into Swiatek’s wheelhouse. Swiatek holds an all-time French Open record of 34-2, a record that seems to show no signs of changing.
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