Twenty years apart, same land

Gibson comes in confident after beating Lys in three sets yesterday, a match where her serve laid down the law with eight aces and a commanding finish. In Rome she went the distance with Shnaider and turned the match around against Trevisan, two matches that show an Australian who’s starting to get to grips with clay, finding her balance between power and patience on a surface that doesn’t come naturally to her.

Zhang, for her part, played a clean, controlled match yesterday against Haddad Maia, dominant on serve and converting her chances on return without forcing it. At 37, she knows this surface inside out: she slides, she gets balls back, she slows the tempo down exactly where Gibson is looking to speed it up. The cold clay in Strasbourg this morning, barely 12 degrees, forces long rallies and deprives the Australian of the ball speed that is her main weapon.