Korneeva targets two in a row, Perez Alarcon plots history for Peru
Alina Korneeva has proved iron-made at the 2023 Roland Garros junior championships so far.
At just 15, the Australian Open champion is showing a lot of maturity in her game: she can battle from the baseline, cut the angles, then defend like a wall or switch to go to the net. She swears that she is an emotional player but, watching her play, it is her apparent composure that impresses.
Her tactical variety paid off again on Friday as she defeated Alisa Oktobrieva 6-1 6-1 to bring an end to the 14-year-old's wild ride at Roland Garros, and book her spot in Saturday's final against Peru's Lucciana Perez Alarcon.
“I practice this a lot with my coach, to go to the net - because it’s my game,” she said when asked if the variation has always come naturally to her. “I love to play volleys and drive volleys so we work a lot on it. It’s better than it was but I can do more. It’s very interesting to play on clay because the points are longer, there are drop shots and slices too.”
On Friday, Korneeva became the first player to reach the girls’ singles final at both the Australian Open and Roland Garros in the same season since 2019, when Leylah Fernandez finished runner-up at the Australian Open and won the title at Roland Garros.
Tomorrow, she could become the first girl to win both of the opening two Grand Slam junior singles titles of the year since Magdalena Maleeva in 1990.
All the more impressive, given that her first Junior Grand Slam appearance came in Melbourne this year.
When winning becomes habitual, is there a sense that those results are normal?
“It’s not normal," laughed Korneeva, the WTA No. 331, who insists she doesn’t feel the Grand Slam pressure.
“My tennis is so different now, as I can play those drop shots and slices, and I think it’s because of the professional tournaments I’ve been able to play"
“I feel like I’m going to play a normal final, like every tournament is the same," she said. "I don’t have the same feeling than in Australia. Also it’s so different, because in Australia I was going through some tough time physically so I wasn’t thinking about the match. Here I can focus totally on the match.”
Korneeva, despite her tender age, won the biggest title of her career at professional level on the ITF World Tennis Tour in March, defeating Timea Babos in the final as a qualifier at W60 in Pretoria.
“My tennis is so different now, as I can play those drop shots and slices, and I think it’s because of the professional tournaments I’ve been able to play. Players there are clever in their tennis and mentally stronger.”
On Saturday, she will find a very mentally strong rival in sixth-seed Perez Alarcon. The Peruvian has been the comeback queen this week, including today, when she recovered from 2-5 down in the opening set to defeat Anastasiia Gureva 7-6(2) 7-5.
She kept getting to one more ball, finding more depth on her forehand, and raising her fist to the air after each big point won. She was up 5-4 30-0 in the second set and got broken back: yet, she returned to the fight like nothing happened.
“It’s been again a very tough match, but I’m very happy with my performance throughout the whole week because I had really tough matches from the first round," said Perez Alarcon, who has been supported in her tennis ambitions by the Grand Slam Player Development Programme, having received a Player Grant earlier this year.
What does she tell herself in those moments to be able, each time, to come back into the match?
“I just tell myself to keep fighting, to keep focusing on every point, to just stay in the moment. If I continue fighting, I know I can stay in the match," she said.
Perez Alarcon is the first Peruvian player to reach a Grand Slam girls’ singles final and is one win away from becoming the third Peruvian player to reach a Grand Slam junior singles final, after 1985 Roland Garros boys’ singles champion Jaime Yzaga and 1997 Roland Garros boys’ singles runner-up Luis Horna.
She is also now the first South American player to reach the Roland Garros girls’ singles final since Colombia’s Mariana Duque Marino in 2007. The last South American girl champion here is Paraguay’s Rossana de los Rios in 1992. She arrived with confidence in Paris after winning three junior titles this year: the J300 in Barranquilla, the J300 in Lima and the J300 in Santa Cruz.
“I have a really good team that is helping me to improve a lot," she said. "It was a tough journey but I just need to keep working hard and all the good things will come.”
She has never faced Korneeva but she doesn’t intend to overthink the next match.
“I just need to keep my focus, to keep the intensity all the time because I know she’s a really good player," she said. "I need to fight on every point until the end.”