With grit and determination. Elisabetta Cocciaretto (no. 44 in the world) showed off all his qualities in WTA quarter final in Birmingham (UK) in front of the Russian Diana Shnaider (world no. 49). On British grass, the girl from the Marche achieved a comeback with a score of 5-7 6-4 6-2, rising in level from the second set onwards and finding greater consistency from his counterattack solutions. Elisabetta, therefore, in the semi-final and the next opponent who will come out of the match between the Kazakh Putintseva and the American Dolehide.
In the first set Cocciaretto is the first to create three consecutive chances to go one break ahead, but Fausto Scolari’s student lacks concreteness. The calm, before the storm, because from that moment on the management of the shifts in service of the two players is far from impeccable. The series of breaks and counter-breaks starts from the seventh game and ends in the twelfth. In this continuous swing of emotions, Elisabetta pays dearly for the lack of consistency of her second, perpetually attacked by her rival. At the score of 7-5 the Russian can smile.
In the second set the performance of both at bat goes up and it is Cocciaretto who plays better in the crucial moment. The Italian badly lost her turn on serve in the sixth game, but from that moment on she definitely changed gear. Finding more aggressiveness from her shots, the player from the Marche turns the situation around and on a score of 6-4 she wins the partial.
In the third set the Russian left-hander struggles a lot to manage the Italian’s pace. Shnaider’s serving games are very long and Elisabetta is good at always remaining there, ready to attack, finding a way to break her opponent’s serve in the third and seventh games, without letting herself be dismayed by the fact of having nullified five break points in the fifth game. At the score of 6-2, the splendid smile of the Italian player peeks out.
