By Roger Childs
Maja Chwalinska entered Roland Garros this year simply hoping to play her way out of qualifying. Instead, she made history — and she’s not done yet. WTA Tennis
Surprises and Certainties
The French grand slam always has plenty of surprises but coming up there are two certainties – in 2026 there will be two new singles champions. As usual there has been a raft of former winners eliminated and there is the prospect that a qualifier will become only the second person in history to achieve the amazing feat of playing extra matches to get into the draw and then go on to lift the trophy. Can Maja Chwalinska emulate the amazing winner of the 2021 Us Open?
Britain’s Emma Raducanu, was the first qualifier ever to win a grand slam. The odds on this ever being repeated are incredibly unlikely.
Raducanu had to play and win three preliminary matches to even get into the first round. So in going on to ultimately win the final she played an extraordinary 10 matches! Even more amazingly, she won all ten without losing a set. Can a Pole in Paris also do the seemingly impossible?
The Men’s final
With the top two ranked players in the world missing – Carlos Alcaraz injured and a sick Jannik Sinner eliminated in the third round – this should be Zverev’s year. The German has never won a grand slam in thirteen years as a professional but has been the beaten finalist in New York and Melbourne. The 29 year old German is currently ranked third in the world.
His opponent will be the 24 year old Italian Flavio Cobolli whose best performance in a grand slam was as a quarter-finalist at Wimbledon last year. Cobolli was due to play his friend and countryman Matteo Arnauldi in the semi-finals, but the later was forced to withdraw because of a virus.
Zverev should be a comfortable winner, but nothing is certain.
The Women’s final
Qualifier Maja Chwalinska will meet 19 year old Russian 8th seed Mirra Andreeva. The latter was a convincing two set winner in her semi-final and, like Cobolli, was a quarter-finalist at Wimbledon in 2025. The Pole had a tougher semi but did win convincingly in two sets.
The Russian is a stronger player with a reliable serve and strong ground strokes, and should prevail. Nevertheless Chwalinska will been very keen to repeat Raducanu extraordinary feat.
Plenty to play for
There will definitely be two new grand slam champions on Monday and I would expect Andreeva and Zverev to come away with the silverware. Hopefully the passionate Roland Garros crowds will witness two quality matches.