French Open Day 12 - Will Maja Chwalinska match Raducanu’s title run?

**Catherine** (0:10)
Hello and welcome to The Tennis Podcast on day 12 of the French Open, a tournament where we have learned to expect the unexpected and yet the most unexpected thing of all has happened today and absolutely none of us saw it coming. World number 114, Maja Chwalinska today became the first ever qualifier to reach a Roland Garros final. She's the third lowest ranked major finalist in the open era of Women's Tennis behind Emma Raducanu and Kim Kleister, who was unranked when she came back to win the 2009 US. Open. And she might, Chwalinska, be everyone's new favorite player. For a story of this magnitude, we have drafted in reinforcements in the form of the Athletics Charlie Eccleshare. Charlie, you are quite often the guy that sees things coming.
I will never forget you picking Marquette Vondrosheva for the 2023 Wimbledon title when she was the last name on everyone else's list. Did you see Maja Chwalinska coming?

**Charlie Eccleshare** (1:18)
I mean, I'd love to pretend I did, but no, I didn't. I mean, I saw her, in fact, in the first round against Junkin Wen.
And again, I'd love to say at that point, I said, look out, look out for this qualifier. She is going to take this tournament by storm. But I didn't. I mean, I thought she was really awkward and not an opponent that players would relish playing, but not for a moment did I think, I mean, she would get anything close to this. How could anyone see this coming? I mean, I'm not sure she would have had any sense that this was coming. It's all just fallen into place for her in the most incredible way. And then you watch her and you're like, yeah. I mean, how far can she take this?

**Catherine** (1:59)
Seven, six, six, four in two hours and 10 minutes, two lengthy grueling sets over Diana Shnaider today. Is that the most fun, David and Matt, that you have had watching a tennis match this week?

**David** (2:10)
Oh, that's a good question because I've had a lot of fun. I really have. But I think maybe that was the most surprising fun I've had. Not that I didn't think Chwalinska was good. It's just I didn't think she was that good. I mean, that was a virtuoso performance showcasing everything she's got. And what she's got is creativity and just incredible nerve to go after some of the things she does.
And a construction in her mind that's like a sort of snooker player that's four shots ahead. She is reading shots that Schneider was going to hit and setting off towards them before she'd even hit them.
And some of her sort of looped deep strokes that she sort of saw bounce and she sort of said, I'm going into the net, just out of the blue. And then the ball would come back and Schneider hadn't been expecting that. And she then just pats away a drop volley winner. It was happening time and time again. Drop shots, sudden sort of injections of pace without, particularly on the backhand side, on the left-handed backhand, which don't look like she's trying to hit the ball hard. And she just strokes it and it just goes away and shocks the opponent for the pace of it.
It had everything. She had that crowd in love with her after about 10, 15 minutes, many of whom probably knew nothing about it, let alone how to say a name. And yet, I mean, I say that, there was an extraordinary number of Polish flags in that crowd. I only realized right at the end quite how many, because when everybody ends up celebrating, you look around the stadium, you're like, I actually don't think I've seen that many red and white flags or that many of any nationalities flags. Maybe Novak Djokovic a couple of times at the Australian Open when everybody's come out for him. But it was really striking. But I think the neutral was just, oh, this player is for us. It's particularly a French crowd.

**Catherine** (4:14)
Matt, including me, how many stats requests have you had this evening pertaining to Maja Chwalinska?

**Matt** (4:21)
Actually, just you. You'll be surprised. People are not coming to me in the press room for stats.

**Charlie Eccleshare** (4:27)
I must confess, I went to Opta. It is their actual job.

**Matt** (4:33)
Yeah, but look, there are a lot of fun ones.

**David** (4:35)
Opta come for him.

**Matt** (4:37)
There are a lot of fun ones. I saw a pick up on the point David made about surprising fun, because obviously we're going to talk more about the other semifinal later. But I was a bit of a low ebb after that one. That was the one today coming into the day that I was really excited for.