Sabalenka sets friendship aside to beat Badosa in Paris; Rybakina advances

No.2 seed Aryna Sabalenka and No.4 seed Elena Rybakina both overturned early break deficits to make the second week of Roland Garros for a second time each. Sabalenka came from 5-3 down in the first set to race away 7-5, 6-1 against Paula Badosa in 77 minutes. Earlier, Rybakina had posted a 6-4, 6-2 win over No.25 seed Elise Mertens in 67 minutes.

Last year, Sabalenka's semifinal run in Paris marked the first time she had made the Roland Garros second week. She returns to that stage for a second year running, and is now two matches away from a seventh consecutive Grand Slam semifinal showing. Up next will be No.22 seed Emma Navarro, who bested Strasbourg champion Madison Keys 7-6(5), 7-6(3).

Rybakina had reached her first Grand Slam quarterfinal in Paris back in 2021, defeating Serena Williams in the 23-time Grand Slam champion's final match at Roland Garros. However, she fell in the 2022 third round to Keys, and withdrew ahead of her 2023 third round against Sara Sorribes Tormo due to illness.

A brand new Roland Garros finalist is guaranteed to come out of the bottom half of the draw, following 2021 runner-up Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova's second-round loss. Sabalenka and Rybakina are two of five remaining players in that half who have previously reached a major final, along with Bianca Andreescu, Zheng Qinwen and Keys.

Sabalenka sets friendship aside for win: Three days after Naomi Osaka took No.1 seed Iga Swiatek to the brink of defeat, it was Sabalenka's turn to be pushed hard by a former Top 3 player on Court Philippe-Chatrier. Badosa, who has spent the past year battling a back injury and whose ranking has fallen to No.139, found some of her best tennis to lead 5-3 in the first set.

The first eight games had seen five breaks of serve between the two. But Sabalenka responded by tightening up her game, dropping just one more point on serve in the first set as she rattled off eight straight games to take a 4-0 lead in the second. Her drop shot proved crucial, too, garnering her three key points en route to her first-set comeback and then the penultimate point of the match.

Sabalenka has now won five straight matches against her good friend Badosa, and leads the overall head-to-head 5-2. Afterwards, she emphasized her belief in the Spaniard's ability to come back strongly from her struggles.

"It's tough to play your best friend," she said in the on-court interview. "She's an incredible player, coming back after injury, and I'm pretty sure she's going to be back on top very soon. It's very tough, but we're good to separate things. On court ... I'm trying not to watch the other side, just to focus on myself and bring my best game."

Sabalenka also acknowledged that the drop shots she has incorporated into her game so well sometimes cause mid-match complications in terms of having more options to choose from. That hadn't been the case here, though.

"Today was a day when I wasn't thinking that much," Sabalenka said. "I was just feeling the game and trusting myself and going for all those shots."

Rybakina in the groove: Prior to this match, Rybakina had won four of her five encounters with Mertens, including a 6-1, 6-0 rout in this year's Brisbane third round. However, the Belgian had been the victor in their only previous clay contest, at Madrid 2021, and pushed Rybakina hard in the first set.

Drawing errors from Rybakina with superb defense and using her shot variety smartly, Mertens twice led by a break. But the former Wimbledon champion broke back immediately both times, and after levelling at 4-4 controlled the flow of the match with supreme ball-striking. Rybakina's backhand was in particularly smooth form: that wing contributed a pinpoint lob to hold for 5-4 and a bullet-like return en route to breaking for the set; a superb short angled pass to bring up her first match point, and a down-the-line winner, her 24th of the match, to seal victory.

Rybakina will next face No.15 seed Elina Svitolina. The Ukrainian eased into the fourth round with a 7-5, 6-2 win over Ana Bogdan.