Thanks Tami!

Elina Svitolina comes into this third round in the best form of her season. Winner of the WTA 1000 in Rome three weeks ago, she has now chained together an eighth consecutive victory after dismissing Kaitlin Quevedo on Wednesday 6-0 6-4, conceding barely four games. Her first round against Anna Bondar had been more laborious over three sets, but since that opening match she has raised her level, and that 6-0 delivered in under thirty minutes against Quevedo is the picture of a player whose confidence is at its peak. At Roland-Garros, Svitolina has reached the quarter-finals five times. She has never faced Korpatsch.

Tamara Korpatsch is writing her own story in Paris this Friday. After nine appearances in the main draw of a Grand Slam without ever getting past the second round, the German defeated 32nd seed Wang Xinyu on Wednesday in a lively match, 6-2 2-6 6-3, managing the closing stages in an electric atmosphere, with both players refusing to shake hands at the net. Her foot speed was the key factor against Wang, with an ability to track down short balls and withstand the Chinese player’s heavy hitting. This season, she has seven wins in her last ten matches, all on clay, and reached the final in Ostrava in February. The level is real. But facing an in-form Svitolina on a Grand Slam run is a different step from anything she has encountered this week.

The gap between the two players in the fundamentals of clay-court tennis is clear. Svitolina covers the court at a level Korpatsch cannot match over the course of a full match, her return is a weapon that will directly target the German’s weaknesses on serve, and on a surface that skids and kicks up high, her counterpunching and redirection will be able to shine in favorable conditions. Korpatsch can hold her own for a set, can create moments, but Svitolina’s consistency over three sets at this stage of the tournament is a wall.