WTA Tournament in Prague

LIVE: Tagger Loses First Set to Krejcikova

Lilli Tagger(Bild: GEPA)

It’s starting to get unbelievable: Lilli Tagger didn’t just reach the final at the WTA tournament in Prague—she also defeated local favorite Barbora Krejčíková, a two-time Grand Slam champion!

The 18-year-old from East Tyrol defeated the WTA No. 26 after 2 hours and 50 minutes, 6-7(5), 6-3, 7-6(4), and is now in a final for the second time, following her appearance in Jiujiang, China, last year. In Sunday’s final, she will face Ukrainian Daria Snigur—this time not as the underdog…

“Crazy. Honestly, right now I can’t even believe I won. I’m super happy,” Tagger said during her on-court interview. “It was an incredible battle; she played great tennis. I saw her three weeks ago at Wimbledon and was a little nervous before the match,” she admitted. In the final stretch, she stayed focused point by point.

Tagger started off very confidently against the two-time Grand Slam champion and was initially unbeatable on her own serve. The East Tyrolean won her first three service games to love, and before that, she secured the first break of the match to make it 3–2. Tagger subsequently led 5–3 but was unable to close out the set at 5–4. Krejcikova broke back to tie it at 5–5, sending the set to a tiebreak. The tiebreak went to 4–4 before the favorite prevailed 7–5 after 59 minutes.

Tagger quickly shook off her disappointment
But Tagger recovered quickly from the disappointment and, with a determined expression and confident body language, continued to believe in herself. After a break to make it 4–2—which Krejcikova “gifted” her with a double fault at 15–40—Tagger then served out the set 6–3, a well-deserved win that evened the match.

Tagger started the third set with a break right away, but she let her 2–0 lead slip away. In the fifth game, Tagger faced four break points—first at 0–40 and then again later—before the 30-year-old Krejcikova rallied once more. After that, the set went to a tiebreak without either player losing her serve, which Tagger secured with her eleventh ace. In the tiebreak, she overcame a 1-3 deficit and converted her first match point at 6-4.

Last year’s champion in the French Open junior girls’ competition demonstrated once again that she has long since made her mark in adult tennis. Both her significantly improved serve and her thunderous groundstrokes made her virtually indistinguishable from the tournament’s No. 2 seed for long stretches of the match. The fact that she was ultimately able to win a close match—at times played at a world-class level—against the far more experienced Krejcikova once again demonstrates the immense potential of Francesca Schiavone’s protégé.