It will be No. 1 vs. No. 2 for the French Open title on Sunday. Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray made sure that would be the case when they rolled through their respective semifinal contests on Friday afternoon at Roland Garros.
Djokovic took care of first-time Grand Slam semifinalist Dominic Thiem 6-2, 6-1, 6-4 on Court Suzanne Lenglen. The top-seeded Serb only encountered trouble in the form of a 3-0 third-set deficit, but he promptly erased it by winning six of the last seven games.
Djokovic-Thiem highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QR_jPQbZuXo
Djokovic: “Best performance of the tournament. As I was hoping after the long fourth round that I’m going to start playing better as the tournament progresses, and that’s what’s happening now. So I’m very pleased with the way things are going. I managed to handle his heavy spin very well today, but I’m sure that, as I told him after the match, we’re going to see a lot of him in the future.”
Thiem: “He was just too strong today. That’s all I can say. But still it inspires me to even work harder. I hope I get a new chance soon in the future…. It was a very good experience, obviously. Of course semis is a very good result for me, but right now I’m really still thinking about the match, still thinking about the loss, and after every loss I’m disappointed.”
Murray beat defending champion Stan Wawrinka 6-4, 6-2, 4-6, 6-2 on Court Philippe Chatrier. Like his upcoming final opponent, the second-seeded Scot endured his lone hiccup in the third set–which he ended up losing with a donation of serve at 4-5. But Murray righted the ship immediately with a quick break to begin the fourth and at that point he was off to the races.
Murray-Wawrinka highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3Vdoax_TWA
Murray: “To reach the finals of the French the first time, that’s a big moment for me. It’s not an easy thing to do. Like I said a few years ago, I never really expected to be able to do that. To play the way that I did today after a tough start to the tournament, yeah, (I) was just really, really happy with that.”
Wawrinka: “The fact that I had won here before had given me more confidence in myself. I thought, ‘Oh, I can go deep in this tournament because I have done it once.’ So today I wanted to go as deep as possible. I wanted to do my best and do the same this year…. I think that Andy played really so well today. He was the strongest on the court. It’s as simple as that.”
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