Follow <\/em>The Athletic\u2019s French Open coverage<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n Welcome to the French Open briefing, where The Athletic\u00a0<\/em>will explain the stories behind the stories on each day of the tournament.<\/p>\n On Day 9, an unlikely quarterfinalist, the beauty of pressure in tennis and a long, slow comeback journey.<\/p>\n If tennis fans are surprised to see 24-year-old Polish player Maja Chwali\u0144ska in the quarterfinals, after defeating the last French singles player standing at Roland Garros, they are not alone.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, it\u2019s definitely a big surprise for me, and I didn\u2019t expect it, surely,\u201d Chwali\u0144ska said with a smile Monday after defeating Diane Parry.<\/p>\n The world No. 114 came through three rounds of qualifying and has dropped just one set, to 2021 semifinalist Maria Sakkari, en route to her first career Grand Slam quarterfinal. She has far surpassed her previous best run at a major \u2014 the second round of Wimbledon in 2022.<\/p>\n She took down the Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen, who was struggling physically,<\/a> in the first round and upset No. 23 seed Elise Mertens in the second with her heavy topspin and deftness in the forecourt. After beating Sakkari in the third round and Parry, 6-3, 6-2 in the fourth, she is the first qualifier to reach the women\u2019s singles quarterfinals at Roland Garros since Martina Trevis\u00e1n in 2020.<\/p>\n When she played Parry on Court Philippe-Chatrier, she made sure to take a picture of the plaque for Rafael Nadal that adorns the court first.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m really grateful for this opportunity,\u201d Chwali\u0144ska said. \u201cIt\u2019s such a beautiful court.<\/p>\n \u201cI knew coming in that it\u2019s going to be a very tough match, you know, with the French crowd, as well, but they were very respectful, I think. They supported Diane, but me as well. I was very grateful for that.\u201d<\/p>\n Chwali\u0144ska isn\u2019t one to take for granted the chance to play on one of tennis\u2019 biggest stages. She took a mental health sabbatical from the sport in 2021 to manage a period of depression, and as a player outside the top 100, has had to deal this week with the logistical realities of an unexpected run in an expensive city.<\/p>\n After her second-round match, she mentioned in her on-court interview that she was struggling to pay for a hotel in Paris because players don\u2019t get paid \u2014 she\u2019ll make just under $550,000 for reaching the quarterfinals \u2014 until after the tournament.<\/p>\n She said later that the Polish company Oshee, which sponsors her compatriot and friend Iga \u015awi\u0105tek, stepped up to help her out with accommodations. Chwali\u0144ska is hoping to extend her reservation at least a few more nights \u2014 she\u2019ll face No. 22 seed Anna Kalinskaya next.<\/p>\n \u2014 Ava Wallace<\/em><\/p>\n If anybody needed a reminder of how different tennis is mentally when a player is ahead compared to behind, two fourth-round matches delivered Monday. First, Russia\u2019s Kalinskaya and Russian-turned-Austrian Anastasia Potapova provided an exhibition in the afternoon.<\/p>\n This was one of those matches when whoever was ahead would tighten up, and whoever was behind would relax and find their range, right up until Kalinskaya, the No. 22 seed, finally hauled herself over the line, 6-4, 2-6, 7-6(10-7).<\/p>\n In the first set, the No. 28 seed Potapova started well and moved to a 4-1 lead. Then she promptly lost five straight games to lose it 6-4.<\/p>\n After Potapova won the second set in straightforward fashion, they moved into a decider. In the third set, Potapova went up a break three times, only to give it straight back each time \u2014 including twice when serving for the match. In between all that, Kalinskaya led 4-1 before she too got tight and gave up four straight games. Once into the tiebreak, it almost felt as though whoever went ahead would be at a disadvantage, and sure enough, Potapova led 3-0 and 4-2 but faltered again with the finish line in sight.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a very mental match for both,\u201d Potapova said in a news conference afterward. \u201cObviously, it seems like for both of us it\u2019s easier to play when you\u2019re loose, because you kind of relax your body, and you just kind of let it go, and you don\u2019t think about it.\u201d<\/p>\n \n Anastasia Potapova (pictured) and Anna Kalinskaya played a seesawing fourth-round match. (Anne-Christine Poujoulat \/ AFP via Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Kalinskaya has also had her issues in that regard, not just Monday. She has never won a WTA title, and in the Berlin Ladies Open final two years ago, she missed five championship points before losing to Jessica Pegula. She joked in her on-court interview after beating her good friend Potapova that she had tried staying cool in the clutch moments, but had more or less abandoned that policy as it clearly wasn\u2019t working.<\/p>\n \u201cI was definitely nervous,\u201d she said in a news conference.<\/p>\n \u201cThe match was very physical. I felt like in third set I was up in the score 4-1. Then I saw she was a bit tired. At 4-1, I started to run out of energy to finish the match, and she was coming back, so that\u2019s why the score was up and down a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n Kalinskaya next faces the world No. 114 Chwali\u0144ska, in what is a huge opportunity to reach a first major semifinal \u2014 and the kind of pressure she could do without. Especially if she builds an early lead.<\/p>\n Later, Matteo Arnaldi and Frances Tiafoe took to the court.<\/p>\n More than five hours later, after Tiafoe played a match he may have nightmares about for some time, and Arnaldi looked like he had lost the match three times over, the Italian was standing at the microphone in the middle of Court Suzanne-Lenglen in a state of disbelief.<\/p>\n For more than two hours, it looked like Tiafoe wouldn\u2019t make much of a stand against Italy\u2019s Arnaldi, even as he knotted their match at 1-1. Then all of a sudden, with Tiafoe leading 4-1 in the fourth set, it looked as if he was going to be able to find his way over the finish line and make the Roland Garros quarterfinals.<\/p>\n No such luck. Arnaldi turned into some version of Carlos Alcaraz, scrambling all over the court, making miracle saves and darting winners down the line. He hoisted lobs that landed on the baseline and sideline, dug out drop shots deep to the back of the court and lamped backhands down the line. Tiafoe got tight, playing with his food a little too much and encouraging Arnaldi to surge.<\/p>\n Serving for the match at 5-4 in the fourth, Tiafoe went up 30-0, then lost five of the next six points to let Arnaldi burst back to even. The tiebreak started and ended with a double fault and off to the fifth set they went.<\/p>\n Tiafoe was on his heels from the start, and Arnaldi got to 4-2. Tiafoe broke back and blasted his way to 4-4. But in the very next game, he was down 0-30 after slipping and getting caked with clay.<\/p>\n This time, there was no escape. Arnaldi broke him at love. Tiafoe slammed his racket on his bag over and over. And it was Arnaldi standing at the microphone, declaring his 7-6(5), 6-7(5), 3-6, 7-6(3), 6-4 win the best five hours and 26 minutes of his life.<\/p>\n \u2014 Charlie Eccleshare<\/em><\/p>\n Few of the many unlikely success stories at this year\u2019s French Open have been as heartwarming as Berrettini\u2019s.<\/p>\n There aren\u2019t many players who have been as cruelly struck down by injury and denied their prime years like he has. Now 30, Berrettini reached the Wimbledon final five years ago and won the first set against Novak Djokovic. He ended up losing in four, but a year later, he looked like he might be in a position to go one better after winning the prestigious Queen\u2019s warmup event for the second year running. But in a sign of things to come, Berrettini tested positive for COVID-19 and withdrew on the morning of his first-round match.<\/p>\n Berrettini had reached a career-high ranking of No. 6 five months earlier, but over the course of 2022 required surgery for ankle and wrist injuries, and has since been plagued by stomach and abdominal issues.<\/p>\n The constant setbacks have been a major factor in why reaching the French Open quarterfinals with a straight-sets win over Juan Manuel Cer\u00fandolo on Monday was Berrettini\u2019s first appearance in the last eight of a major since the 2022 Australian Open. He came into the French Open ranked No. 107, and no one was expecting anything from him; now he is in the last eight.<\/p>\n If doing it with his injury history is a huge achievement, then recovering sufficiently to beat Cer\u00fandolo after a five-hour-and-16-minute epic against Francisco Comesa\u00f1a in the previous round was truly remarkable, even considering that Cer\u00fandolo had played an even longer match of five hours and 57 minutes in his third round against Mart\u00edn Landaluce of Spain.<\/p>\n \n Matteo Berrettini made his best run at a Grand Slam since 2022. (Dan Isitene \/ Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n In any case, there was Berrettini, blasting trademark forehands and recovering from a break down in the third set and then 6-3 in the tiebreak to win five straight points and surge for the finish line.<\/p>\n After a 6-3, 7-6(2), 7-6(6) win, he said in his on-court interview that tennis was \u201cthe love of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere were moments when it was really tough to go back and hit the ball because I wasn\u2019t ready,\u201d Berrettini said.<\/p>\n He\u2019s looked ready in Paris, and next up faces his compatriot Arnaldi at the stage of a Slam he must have thought he\u2019d never reach again.<\/p>\n \u2014 Charlie Eccleshare<\/em><\/p>\n Arnaldi of Italy did not just come back to stun Tiafoe 7-6(5), 6-7(5), 3-6, 7-6(3), 6-4; he also got this stunning exchange in his memory bank:<\/p>\n 🐐 Serena Williams is coming back to tennis<\/a>. The 23-time Grand Slam champion will start with a doubles wild card into Queen\u2019s, the Wimbledon warmup event in London.<\/p>\n 💰 Paraguayan player Adolfo Daniel Vallejo was fined $65,000<\/a> for saying that a female umpire wasn\u2019t strong enough to officiate his second-round match. He lost.<\/p>\n 🌟 Naomi Osaka and Aryna Sabalenka<\/a>\u2019s fourth-round duel was all about star power.<\/p>\n 🇪🇸 Rafael J\u00f3dar, who meets tournament favorite Alexander Zverev in the quarterfinals, is upending the way tennis thinks about Spanish players<\/a> on clay.<\/p>\n 🔬 The relationship between electronic line calling and line judges on clay<\/a> continues to confuse players and fans \u2014 partly because broadcasters don\u2019t know how to explain it.<\/p>\n 🎾 Women\u2019s singles: Mirra Andreeva (8) vs. Sorana C\u00eerstea (18)<\/b> 5 a.m. ET on TNT, HBO Max<\/b> Another test of Andreeva\u2019s credentials as a favorite at the French Open, 12 months after the pressure of the same status caused her to unravel on Court Philippe-Chatrier against French wild-card Lo\u00efs Boisson<\/a>. C\u00eerstea, the 36-year-old having the season of her life<\/a>, which she also plans to be her last, has been swinging freely all year and will be a dangerous opponent. For Andreeva, 19, it\u2019s all about playing aggressive tennis when ahead and expected to win, instead of when behind.<\/p>\n 🎾 Women\u2019s singles: Elina Svitolina (7) vs. Marta Kostyuk (15)<\/b> 7 a.m. ET on TNT, HBO Max<\/b><\/p>\n This duel between two Ukrainians, which will guarantee a first women\u2019s semifinalist from the country at the French Open, is also a duel between the two best clay-court players on the WTA this year. Kostyuk<\/a>, 23, is 16-0 on clay in 2026. She won the WTA 1000 Madrid Open in April, before Svitolina, 31, won the Italian Open<\/a>, at the same level, in May. That completed a Ukrainian sweep of the two most prestigious clay events before the French Open. One of the two will have an opportunity to get to the final of the biggest one of all.<\/p>\n 🎾 Men\u2019s singles: Rafael J\u00f3dar (27) vs. Alexander Zverev (3)<\/b> 9 a.m. ET on TNT, HBO Max<\/b><\/p>\n Zverev, the 29-year-old three-time Grand Slam finalist, is three wins away from the major title that has so far eluded him \u2014 and he will not have to play Carlos Alcaraz or Jannik Sinner<\/a>. He will have to play under all kinds of pressure \u2014 being the top seed, possibly not getting such a chance again \u2014 and he will have to play J\u00f3dar<\/a>. The fearless 19-year-old Spaniard, who can crack a groundstroke on both sides and sweep forward at will, has the tennis to make Zverev\u2019s life very uncomfortable. The German will need to use his major experience in a big way and for the first time this tournament.<\/p>\n 🎾 Men\u2019s singles: Jakub Men\u0161\u00edk (26) vs. Jo\u00e3o Fonseca (28)<\/b> Not before 2:15 p.m. ET on TNT<\/b><\/p>\n Men\u0161\u00edk, 20, and Fonseca, 19, join J\u00f3dar as the youngest and most fizzingly exciting players in the men\u2019s field \u2014 and one of them has to exit. Fonseca has proved his big-time bona fides by beating Djokovic<\/a> (in five sets) and Casper Ruud back to back, while Men\u0161\u00edk has come through cramps and heat exhaustion while hitting his forehand with more authority and power than at any other time in his career. Their night session should be sublime.<\/p>\n Tell us what you noticed on the ninth day \u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\nHow did a qualifier continue her dream run?<\/h2>\n
How did two matches underscore the beauty of pressure?<\/h2>\n
How did Matteo Berrettini write a new story?<\/h2>\n
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<\/p>\nOther notable results on Day 9:<\/h3>\n
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Shot<\/strong>\u00a0of the day<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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<\/div>\n<\/div>\nDrop Shots<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Up next: Quarterfinals<\/h3>\n
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<\/b>French Open women\u2019s draw 2026<\/h3>\n
French Open men\u2019s draw 2026<\/h3>\n