{"id":7631,"date":"2026-05-29T00:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T00:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/7631\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T00:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T00:54:15","slug":"sabalenka-storms-into-last-32-gauff-reaches-french-open-third-round","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/7631\/","title":{"rendered":"Sabalenka storms into last 32 , Gauff reaches French Open third round"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" alt=\"Aryna Sabalenka in action during her Women's 2nd round match against Elsa Jacquemot of France at the French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament at Roland Garros in Paris, France, 28 May 2026. EPA\/MOHAMMED BADRA\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"912\" height=\"570\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"html-img h-auto w-full\" style=\"color:transparent\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/5d4ee0ec-sabalenka-paris-epa-29_05_26.webp\"\/>Aryna Sabalenka in action during the women\u2019s 2nd round match against Elsa Jacquemot at the French Open at Roland Garros in Paris.\u00a0 (EPA Images pic)<br \/>\nPARIS: World number one Aryna Sabalenka eased into the third round at Roland Garros on Thursday with a 7-5, 6-2 win over France\u2019s Elsa Jacquemot.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">Sabalenka snatched a tight opening set with a break in the final game and then swept Jacquemot aside to set up a meeting with Australia\u2019s Daria Kasatkina.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">The Belarusian has reached the final at five of the past six Grand Slams. She finished runner-up to Coco Gauff at last year\u2019s French Open.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">Meanwhile, Coco Gauff continued her French Open title defence with a straight-sets victory over Egyptian qualifier Mayar Sherif in the second round on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">The American fourth seed was too strong for the world number 129 on Court Suzanne Lenglen, winning 6-3, 6-2.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">Gauff will next face either in-form Austrian 28th seed Anastasia Potapova or Britain\u2019s Katie Boulter in the last 32.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">\u201cIt was a physical match, a tough match, my patience was really tested today,\u201d said Gauff.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"912\" height=\"570\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"html-img h-auto w-full\" style=\"color:transparent\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/10e1d8fe-gauffchina-afp28_09_25.webp\"\/>Coco Gauff was below her best but never in danger of an upset defeat. \u00a0(AFP pic)<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">The 22-year-old, who has reached at least the quarter-finals at Roland Garros in each of the past five years, was not at her best but was never in danger of suffering an upset defeat.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">\u201cNo expectations,\u201d she insisted when asked if winning the title last year raised her hopes this time around. \u201cI\u2019m just having fun.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">She broke Sherif seven times in total during a match in which both players struggled on serve, but sealed the win after an hour and 50 minutes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"py-1.5 mb-4 text-lg\">Sherif has still never reached the third round at a Grand Slam tournament, after losing in round two for the fourth time in five years in Paris.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aryna Sabalenka in action during the women\u2019s 2nd round match against Elsa Jacquemot at the French Open at&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[3687,217,115,2816,517,2265,28],"class_list":["post-7631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-aryna-sabalenka","tag-3687","tag-aryna-sabalenka","tag-france","tag-gauff","tag-open","tag-sabalenka","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7631","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=7631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}