Francesca Schiavone sat with a towel draped over her head like a shroud, shielding her eyes from the deep deficit she faced—and muffling her ears from the sounds of Anastasia Pavlyunchenkova’s winners whizzing past. The oldest woman left in the draw was staring down a 6-1, 4-1 deficit to the youngest woman remaining, and the 30-year-old Schiavone’s wiggle room had shrunk to the size of the Lotto logo on her shirt. Schiavone tossed her towel aside, arose, then threw everything she had at the Russian teenager.
The defending champion danced dangerously on the ledge of a loss, found her footing in winning 11 of the next 13 games and staved off a late surge from No. 14 seed before bending a backhand pass down the line to reach her second straight Roland Garros semifinal with a frenetic 1-6, 7-5, 7-5 triumph.
The fifth-seeded Italian relied as much on her savvy as her shotmaking skills in subduing her former French Open doubles partner, who spent the first set-and-a-half blowing a skittish Schiavone away on a breezy day. Swirling winds, acute-angle running winners, foot faults and an untimely broken string—when Schiavone was serving for the match at 6-5—added to the drama. The tennis veered from fitful to forceful as both women battled nerves and the challenging conditions that drove up the degree of difficulty.
Pavlyuchenkova pounded a forehand to snare a 4-0 lead 16 minutes into the match as a shell-shocked Schiavone left returns short in the court, was frequently forced to hit off her back foot and at times framed her trusty backhand. Wearing a long-sleeved top to protect her from the chill, Pavlyuchenkova was cool in exploiting 15 Schiavone errors to seize the first set before building a 4-1 lead in the second.
Serving at 4-5, 30-all, Schiavone slid an ace down the T and followed with a forehand down the line to hold for 5-5. That critical hold—which preceded Pavlyuchenkova’s double fault to hand Schiavone the break and a 6-5 lead—sparked a six-game surge from Schiavone that seemed to give her command of the match, eventually earning a 3-0 lead in the third.
The 19-year-old refused to give up the fight. If Pavlyuchenkova gets fitter, faster and refines her shot selection, she will be a force in the Top 10. The former French Open junior finalist showed her competitive spirit in shirking a 1-5 third-set deficit, lifting a loopy lob (and raising a clenched fist shortly after) of a return to break back for 5-all.
Working the width of the court, Schiavone hooked a forehand to break back for 6-5. Serving for the semifinals again, Schiavone saw her first match point erased after a 19-shot rally and watched the second disappear when Pavlyuchenkova pounced on a 75 mph second serve, flat-lining a forehand return winner. But Schiavone sealed the match with a backhand up the line to set up a semi with either 2009 French Open champ Svetlana Kuznetsova or 11th-seeded Frenchwoman Marion Bartoli. Schiavone fought off six match points in outlasting Kuznetsova in a 4 hour, 44-minute marathon—the longest women’s Grand Slam match in Open Era history—at this year's Australian Open.
—Richard Pagliaro