Elina Svitolina turned things round to overwhelm the competition at the Italian Open. Her loss in the opening set turned into a complete rout on Corte Pietrangeli winning 3-6, 6-0, 6-0 against
Mona Barthel. The German had 43 unforced errors and 10 double faults that made it more of a cake walk for Svitolina to glide into the quarterfinals.
The Ukrainian came into the round of sixteen with not only a 2-1 series lead against the German but also has taken her on clay prior. She earned a straight sets victory against Barthel on her home soil in a tight quarterfinal that she fought hard holding the German back. The adversity remained in the 26-year-old as she is known for fighting to the bitter end. Svitolina wanted nothing more than to avoid another nail biter like the one previous against Alize Cornet where the second set ended in a 13-11 tiebreak. Svitolina remained adamant about making the best of what came her way and do work right away.
She took a 2-0 lead on Barthel initiating the break followed by a solid service hold in the second. The German did her best to get on the board as challenging Svitolina is a difficult task especially in the early stages. Her persistence paid off big on the break as she found a way to win on deuce and even the score. She almost had a lead after firing off a pair of aces but the Ukrainian fought back on deuce to win the game and stay on the mark. Barthel brushed off the opportunity and found another that she consolidated into her first push out front after seven.
It was a call for Svitolina to speak with coach Andrew Bettles who told her to keep working and read the changes that Barthel made on the returns. It was a lot harder than either of them thought as the 26-year-old played well on serves and placed a lot of shots away from the world number 11 to get into a spot to serve for the set. Despite having another couple of double faults and one during her final game, Barthel launched herself to win the set 6-3 after 51 minutes. There was clearly a need for improvement to bring in the second set as she was performing below average while Barthel was having a solid outlook.
Everything changed between the players as the German had troubles stopping Svitolina who was on fire right from the start. She took the opening game on service and brought so much offense that Barthel had trouble answering. She soon found herself in a big whole as Svitolina rushed through the games scoring breaks and a love service. By the time she reached a 5-0 run, the game of the German’s was missing as the Ukrainian reached three very easy set points on double faults.
Barthel added a fourth consecutive that gave her opponent life and momentum to use going into the decider. It took her 26 minutes to level the match at one all with a dominating performance on first serve points won and just two unforced errors. Barthel only won 11 points out of 38 total.
Knowing that she was in trouble, Barthel watched as Svitolina won a seventh straight before fighting tooth and nail to hold her own serve. The two went to deuce but gaining the advantage for herself was easier said than done as the 22-year-old pressured in the rally for it to come back over landing long. It became a brutal journey for Barthel as she had nothing left to answer the rush from Svitolina who never left off the gas and rushed through game after game to a point where she won ten in a row. With one final game on the line, Barthel tried to bring any tricks into the game but the world number 11 had a response like no other to some of the shots. Svitolina wasted no time reaching a double match point which came in the form of a 10th double fault. The third set ended as quickly as the second making it a complete shutdown of competition and a clean break for the eighth seed after 1 hour and 41 minutes.
While it was an easy walk to the finish line, the 22-year-old Ukrainian couldn’t celebrate long as she’d await the winner between Swiss star Timea Bacsinszky and Czech powerhouse Karolina Pliskova on Friday.
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