Radio Romania International Sports club

Romanian tennis player Elena Gabriela Ruse this past Wednesday advanced to the women's doubles semifinals as part of the year's first Grand Slam tournament, the Australian Open. In the quarterfinals, Elena Gabriela Ruse and Ukraine's Marta Kostiuk defeated Australia's Storm Hunter and 4th-seeded tennis player, Belgium's Elise Mertens, 7-6, 2-6, 6-4.

It took Elena Gabriela Ruse and Marta Kostiuk two and a half hours of play to win the confrontation. The two succeeded their peak performance in a Grand Slam tournament. Elena Gabriela Ruse and Marta Kostiuk had a rather sluggish start as the scoreboard displayed a 2-nil advantage for Hunter and Mertens. Yet Ruse and Kostiuk came from behind and forced the tiebreak, securing a first-set, 8-6 win as Hunter and Mertens had a 5-2 lead earlier into the game. In the second set, Hunter and Mertens had no problem securing a 6-2 win, even though Ruse and Kostiuk had won the first two games of the set. In the third set, which was the decisive one, Ruse and Kostiuk began with a break, then later during the game secured a 5-2 advantage and eventually won the set, 6-4.

Having advanced to the Australian Open's quarterfinals, Elena-Gabriela Ruse and Marta Kostiuk received 210,000 AUD and were granted 780 WTA points, according to the women's double rankings, In the semifinals, Ruse and Kostiuk are pitted against top-seeded opponents, Australian Open title holders, the all-Czech pair made of Barbora Krejcikova and Katerina Siniakova,

The other Romania tennis players competing in Melbourne have all been eliminated from competition. In the women's singles, it was only Irina Begu who reached as far as the second round. We recall this past Thursday Begu was defeated by Laura Siegemund of Germany. In the women's doubles, apart from Elena-Gabriela Ruse, Monica Niculescu also had a satisfactory run, pairing up with Swiss player Viktorija Golubic. Monica and Victorija were unable to go past the round of 16 as they were defeated by Hunter and Mertens, the pair that laser was eliminated by Ruse and Kostiuk. Niculescu and Golubic will be rewarded with a cheque worth 67,250 AUD and 240 WTA points. (EN)