{"id":55742,"date":"2026-08-22T23:31:53","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T23:31:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/55742\/"},"modified":"2026-08-22T23:31:53","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T23:31:53","slug":"pegula-beats-defending-champ-swiatek-to-reach-cincinnati-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/55742\/","title":{"rendered":"Pegula beats defending champ Swiatek to reach Cincinnati final"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"American Jessica Pegula in action during her women\u2019s singles semi-final match at the Cincinnati Masters. (EPA Images pic)
\nCINCINNATI: World number three Jessica Pegula out-lasted defending champion Iga Swiatek 7-5, 4-6, 6-4 on Saturday to reach the final of the ATP-WTA Cincinnati Masters.<\/p>\n

Pegula rallied from a break down in the final set to subdue six-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek in a tense battle that lasted two hours and 47 minutes.<\/p>\n

The American will face either unseeded Czech Sara Bejlek or fourth-ranked Coco Gauff in Sunday\u2019s final.<\/p>\n

Bejlek, 20, went into their Saturday night semi-final seeking another big upset, having knocked off world number one Aryna Sabalenka in the fourth round.<\/p>\n

Pegula is chasing her third title of 2026 having won the 1000 level event in Dubai and lifted the trophy in Charleston.<\/p>\n

She slowed a Swiatek resurgence that had seen the former world number one from Poland claim her first title of 2026 in Toronto this month.<\/p>\n

Swiatek and Pegula took the court 30 minutes late due to rain and the match was interrupted briefly after just two games.<\/p>\n

A tense first set lasted more than an hour and featured seven breaks of serve, Swiatek agonizingly smacking a volley into the net on set point.<\/p>\n

After forcing the deciding set Swiatek took a 3-1 lead in the third, but Pegula regained the break and broke again when Swiatek double-faulted on break point to fall behind 5-4.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"American Jessica Pegula in action during her women\u2019s singles semi-final match at the Cincinnati Masters. (EPA Images pic)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55743,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[12743,185,247,183,2490],"class_list":["post-55742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jessica-pegula","tag-cincinnati-masters","tag-coco-gauff","tag-iga-swiatek","tag-jessica-pegula","tag-sara-bejlek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55742"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55742\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}