Tennis, Engie Open du Périgord (second round): Mathilde Lollia, last Frenchwoman in the singles
It's official: with Marie Mattel competing in doubles, Mathilde Lollia is the last Frenchwoman in singles at the Engie Open tournament in Périgueux. She qualified fairly easily on Thursday and is eager to reach the quarterfinals.
The Engie Open de Périgueux didn't escape the rain this Thursday. Well, as the president of the CAP tennis padel, Bernard Darqué, would say, "it wasn't much in the end." At around 12:30 p.m., Bolsova (Spain) and Kazionova (Russia), who were playing the third set, quickly got out of the way, as did the doubles, where the French players Bourdeilletas and Skoric were in trouble. All of this delayed the other matches that followed, notably that of Chloé Noel, one of the three French players still in the running.
And these have had mixed fortunes. Starting with Astrid Lew Yan Foon, who faced the number 1 seed, Brazil's Carolina Alves. The day before, the latter had made short work of Bougouffa, who was still too tender, but against Lew Yan Foon, Alves had more trouble. She had to chase after her opponent, who won the first two games. Focused on her match and encouraged by her coach, Alves gradually recovered to win 6-3, 6-3. She was the first Frenchwoman to fall. The second was Chloé Noel.
In the rose-lined aisles of the CAP tennis padel, the well-seated veterans pointed to Noel's opponent: Georgian Ekaterine Gorgodze, seeded number 2. "She's 33 years old," said one, "she's played at Roland-Garros and Wimbledon," whispered another, "she has more than 1,000 matches under her belt and more than 500 victories," someone whispered behind, "and did you know she won a $900,000 prize?" asked a final one. A real opponent, then. Especially since the builds were not the same, between the Frenchwoman, very solid and tall, and the Georgian, short and stocky. Not even an hour of play on court 5 and Gorgodze sent the Frenchwoman flying (6-1, 6-2).
Only Mathilde Lollia remained, who had had an easy match the day before in her confrontation with Poland's Falkowska. This time she faced Jenny Duerst, the Swiss, a tough winner against Marie Mattel, and the least we can say is that not everything was easy in this match. Firstly, because Lollia was broken several times, even though she could have made her point. "From the start of the match, I felt good about my tennis, and the difficulty was to keep that feeling until the end and not to fall because I had a good player on my side. As soon as I played a little less well, she played very well," admitted Mathilde Lollia, very happy with her 6-3, 6-3 victory in the final match of the match. "Oh, really, I'm last," she marveled. "I hope I will go as far as possible for France," she added with a smile.
To do this, they will have to overcome a wall: Gorgodze in the quarter-finals.
Dordogne Libre
