The British No. 1 Emma Raducanu takes on former world No. 5 Jelena Ostapenko in the semi-finals of the Korea Open on Saturday.
The 19-year-old has reached her first semi-final after the 2021 US Open triumph. She made it to the quarter-final stage in three previous tournaments but couldn’t progress further. The Bromley-based Raducanu came into the tournament on the back of a disastrous US Open 2022 campaign. However, she has shown signs of improvement and seems to have regained her mojo.
She began her stint in Korea with a solid win against Moyuka Uchijima albeit with a little stutter towards the closing stages of the second set. In the round of 16, she blew away Yanina Wickmayer in the first set but once again won the second set after a little wobble. In the quarter-final clash against Magda Linette, Raducanu played her best match and didn’t give her Polish opponent any chance to put up a fight. The former world No. 10 won the match 6-2, 6-2.
The former French Open champion also had a forgettable campaign in Flushing Meadows. She crashed out in the first round following a loss to Qinwen Zheng. The Latvian star had to dig deep in her first couple of matches before comprehensively winning her quarter-final tie.
Ostapenko survived a scare against young Korean Boyoung Jeong in the first round of the Korea Open. She won the match 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (7-2). In the second round, the 25-year-old defeated Anastasia Gasanova in three sets. Like Raducanu, Ostapenko played her best match in the quarter-finals. She completely bamboozled Victoria Jimenez Kasintseva to win the match 6-2, 6-1.
The head-to-head currently stands at 0-0 as Emma Raducanu and Jelena Ostapenko have never faced each other before.
Prediction: Emma Raducanu to win in three sets.
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