Deep into one of the finest wins of Jessica Pegula’s career, the Bon Jovi rock anthem Livin’ on a Prayer blared out over the sound system during a changeover. Clearly the stadium DJ in Montreal has a wicked sense of humour.
By that stage, Pegula had been struggling for two hours and 19 minutes to see off Iga Swiatek and, to judge by the way things had been going, the pair may indeed have been only “half way there”.
Certainly they had been living on a prayer. How else to describe a match in which two of the best players on the planet could barely hold serve, let alone force a decisive breakthrough? On an afternoon that featured a combined total of 19 service breaks – from a whopping 31 break points – momentum swung back and forth like a kite caught in a hurricane.
That Pegula finally prevailed, putting two previous Canadian Open semi-final losses behind her to reach the third WTA 1000 final of her career 6-2, 6-7 (4-7), 6-4, says much about the 29-year-old’s resolve and resilience.
Swiatek, the Polish world No 1, has been the architect of some of Pegula’s most galling setbacks. Last year, she denied her rival in the French and US Open quarter-finals, as well as besting her in the last four in Miami and San Diego. Pegula began the season with a brilliant straight-sets win over Swiatek at the United Cup, but her sole win at tour level came four years ago in Washington, and when the pair met in Doha earlier this year she came away with just three games.
That wretched sequence twice looked certain to end much earlier than it did, first when Pegula led by a set and 5-4, then when the third-ranked American held a 4-2 lead in the ensuing tiebreak. But Swiatek, swinging freely, mounted a brilliant rearguard action on each occasion, leaving the outcome of one of the season’s stranger duels in doubt until the very last ball.
“I felt like if I could have held to go up 5-3 in the second, I could have broken her judging by the fact that I was breaking a lot,” said Pegula.
“But she hit one good return, and then I made a bad forehand error. It was swirling with the wind, and I kind of took my mind off it.
“I felt like then, after that, she started to play really well. Even though I served for it at 5-4, I thought she played a great game. She hit two lines and just went for her shots, and sometimes that just happens.”
That was not all that happened. With Pegula 4-3 up in the tiebreak, and Swiatek rising to meet an overhead, the stadium DJ made his or her presence felt in bizarre fashion as the opening lines of the Rednex hit Cotton Eye Joe rang out. Where did it come from? Nobody knew. Where did it go? To a place Pegula did not appreciate. The point was replayed, Swiatek reeled off the next 11 points in a row, and Pegula found herself staring down the barrel against her nemesis at 0-2 in the decider.
“I just thought it was funny,” said Pegula. “I’ve never had that happen, let alone with Cotton Eye Joe. “I was like, ‘Is this really happening right now?’ Of all the songs. It was just, like, what is going on?”
Swiatek could have been forgiven for asking herself the same question. Pushed to deciding sets by both Karolina Muchova and Danielle Collins en route to her first Canadian Open semi-final, the 22-year-old has struggled to find her very best level this past week. But one aspect of her game that has been working well – both here and in Warsaw, where she won her fourth title of the season a fortnight ago – has been her serve, which has carried noticeably more bite. The growing effectiveness of Swiatek’s delivery has been reflected in ace count – seven against Muchova, six against Collins – and her recent confidence on serve only made her struggles more puzzling.
“I think we are good returners, so maybe that’s why, but it’s hard to say,” said Swiatek after winning just 51% of her first-serve points and 30% behind the second. “For sure we were pushing each other on our returns, so maybe that’s why.”
Swiatek did not entirely share Pegula’s view that the switch to heavier balls, which will also be in use at the US Open later this month, was to blame for a problem that has affected several players this week.
“There is a difference, that’s why we’re changing them,” acknowledged the Pole, who voiced dissatisfaction with the regular duty Wilson balls used over the US Open series last year.
“But it’s our job to adjust and to kind of technically adjust our game style for the ball.”
Pegula can reflect with satisfaction on the completion of a notable American double. Following Tommy Paul’s victory over Carlos Alcaraz in the men’s event in Toronto, it is the first time since the 2008 Miami Open that players from the US have defeated both the men’s and women’s No 1s in the same week.
Pegula will now face either Elena Rybakina, the third seed, or Russia’s Liudmila Samsonova, seeded 15th, as she bids to capture add a second title at this level to the one she claimed last year in Guadalajara. The winner between Rybakina and Samsonova will be forced to double up on Sunday after rain forced organisers to postpone the second semi-final.
In the Toronto final, Jannik Sinner will face Alex de Minaur with both players bidding for a first Masters 1000 crown. Sinner ended Paul’s run with a 6-4, 6-4 win, while De Minaur saw off Spain’s Alejandro Davidovich Fokina 6-1, 6-3.