Unbreakable Curse: Every Time Svitolina Reaches a Grand Slam Semifinal, She Gets Swept Away

It is widely recognized that entering the main draw of a Grand Slam is difficult, and securing strong results there is even tougher. Yet, one player has managed to reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam tournament four times. Sadly, once she reached the semifinals, she never managed to win even a single set against her opponents. Even more disappointing, in these matches, she never won more than three games in any set. So, who exactly is this player? In which Grand Slam events did she reach the semifinals? And how did she perform after reaching that stage? Let this article take you through the story.

This player is Ukrainian Elina Svitolina, who won the French Open junior title at Roland Garros back in 2010. After turning professional, Svitolina showed strong performances, having won twelve tour titles before 2019, including an impressive undefeated run to claim the 2018 WTA Finals championship.

At the end of July 2019, Svitolina, seeded eighth and having reached the Grand Slam quarterfinals four times, competed at Wimbledon. She defeated Australian player Saville, Russian Gasparyan, Greek Sakari, and Croatian Martić to reach her first Wimbledon quarterfinal in her career.

In the quarterfinals, Svitolina won in straight sets against Czech player Muchová, advancing to her first Grand Slam semifinal. Unfortunately, in the semifinals against Romanian Simona Halep, she was completely dominated and lost 3–6, 1–6. It is worth noting that Zhang Shuai also performed well at Wimbledon that year, reaching her second Grand Slam quarterfinal, where she was also defeated by Halep.

At the end of August, Svitolina entered the US Open as the fifth seed. She played impressively, reaching her second Grand Slam semifinal and becoming the first Ukrainian player ever to reach the US Open semifinals. In the semis, she faced American star Serena Williams, where Svitolina was powerless, winning only four games in the entire match and suffering a heavy defeat. It is notable that Wang Qiang reached her first Grand Slam quarterfinal at the 2019 US Open, which remains her only Grand Slam quarterfinal appearance to date.

In July 2023, Svitolina entered Wimbledon as a wildcard. Despite low expectations, she fought through the draw, even defeating then-world No.1 Polish player Iga Świątek, reaching her third Grand Slam semifinal. However, in the semis against Czech player Markéta Vondroušová, she was defeated 3–6, 3–6, falling short of advancing further.

This year at the Australian Open, after reaching her fourth Grand Slam quarterfinal, Svitolina swept past two-time Grand Slam champion American Coco Gauff to reach her first Australian Open semifinal. Sadly, she was decisively beaten 2–6, 3–6 by world No.1 Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus in the semifinals and had to exit the tournament.

Four times reaching Grand Slam semifinals but always swept away by opponents, Svitolina’s fate seems rather unfortunate. Will she be able to break this curse? Let us wait and see! That’s the tennis story for today; more to come tomorrow.(Source: Tennis Home, Author: Yixin Jushi)