Elina Svitolina entered Wimbledon last Monday as a significant underdog to win her first grand slam title. Her odds were in fact 100-1 as she was the 76th ranked player in the world prior to the third grand slam of the tennis calendar.
One major reason why Svitolina was ranked so low is because she took 14 months off away from tennis to give birth to her daughter that she had with husband Gael Monfils of France. Svitolina has also experienced personal hardship in the last year. That is because her native country of Ukraine is currently being invaded by Russia.
Those in charge of the betting line seemed to ignore the fact that Svitolina has played high quality tennis in her return. In late May, Svitolina won Strasbourg as she defeated Anna Blinkova of Russia 6-2, 6-3 in the final. That was followed by a quarterfinal berth at the French Open. Svitolina is also a two-time grand slam semifinalist, having made the final four of Wimbledon and the United States Open in 2019.
Now in the odds makers’s defense, Svitolina was completely clobbered 6-2, 6-0 in her only grass court appearance leading up to Wimbledon. In the first round of the Birmingham Classic, Svitolina was outmatched by Linda Fruhvirtova of the Czech Republic.
On Tuesday in the semifinals, we saw the outstanding tennis that Svitolina can produce. In three sets, she took out the world number one and 2023 French Open champion Iga Swiatek of Poland, 7-5, 6-7, 6-2. The major difference in the match was unforced errors. Svitolina had 25, while Swiatek had 41. The win over Swiatek came after an amazing fourth round win by Svitolina, where she beat Victoria Azarenka of 2-6, 6-4, 7-6.
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