Belinda Bencic, enjoying in her first Wimbledon quarterfinal in 9 appearances on the All England Membership, upset Russian teen sensation Mirra Andreeva 7-6 (3), 7-6 (2) on Wednesday to achieve her second Grand Slam semifinal and first in six years.
“I am simply speechless, actually,” stated Bencic, who was unseeded for the match. “So comfortable.”
On Thursday she is going to face No. 8 Iga Swiatek, a five-time Grand Slam champion who will even be making her debut within the final 4 at Wimbledon.
The No. 7-seeded Andreeva, who was bidding to develop into the primary 18-year-old within the girls’s draw to achieve the Wimbledon semifinals since Maria Sharapova in 2005, hadn’t dropped a set in 4 matches and had performed one set previous 4-all.
Bencic, who at 28 is a decade older than Andreeva, is competing in her second main match since returning to the tour after giving delivery to her first baby — a daughter named Bella — in April 2024.
She missed final 12 months’s Wimbledon whereas she was on maternity go away and returned to competitors final October. After beginning the 12 months ranked No. 489, she is ready to achieve the High 20 after this fortnight.
Bencic, whose solely different main semifinal look got here on the 2019 US Open, was certainly one of 9 moms within the Wimbledon singles draw, however is the one one nonetheless in rivalry.
She joined Martina Hingis as the one Swiss girls to achieve the Wimbledon semifinals within the Open period.
Bencic closed with 66-1 odds to win this 12 months’s match, in accordance with ESPN BET. The previous three girls’s champions all had odds of 80-1 or longer (Elena Rybakina in 2022 was 100-1, Marketa Vondrousova in 2023 was 80-1, and Barbora Krejcikova final 12 months was 100-1).
ESPN Analysis contributed to this report.