Jessica Pegula spoke about her consistency and the level at which she is competing after reaching yet another semifinal. The American defeated Clara Tauson in three sets to book her spot in the last four of the Dubai Tennis Championships.
Pegula has now reached the semifinals in each of the last seven tournaments she has competed in. While a title has evaded her in each of those events, the 31-year-old has established herself as one of the most consistent players on the WTA Tour.
Jessica Pegula on Hard-Fought Win Over Tauson in Dubai Quarterfinal
Pegula was in top form once again on Thursday as she claimed a 6-3, 2-6, 6-4 win over Tauson and secured her place in the last four of the Dubai Tennis Championships. During her post-match on-court interview, she reflected on her match against Tauson.
After comfortably winning the first set, the fourth seed found it difficult to continue that momentum in the second.
She credited her opponent’s serve as one of the reasons for her struggles in the second set, saying, “She’s a powerful player, a really good server. I felt like I had chances the first couple of return games, but I just made a couple of errors on some short balls and some balls that I kind of just let slip.”
“Then I felt like she got into a really good rhythm on her serve, it was really tough to read for a while there, got a little bit windy. But I got my feet back under me, I think I found some extra energy in the third to establish that I wasn’t going to go away. It could have gone either way there at the end, but [I] just kind of stuck with it,” Pegula added.
While Tauson won 80% of points on her first serve, Pegula was a lot sharper with her return on her opponent’s second serve. That proved to be the difference in the end in what was otherwise a very tight match. Pegula, who now has more than 100 WTA 1000 wins to her name, was also asked about her consistency on the WTA Tour.
“I’m playing really well every single week, I think competing really hard, coming into these tournaments with a lot of confidence with my match toughness and I think [I’ve] gotten better honestly as well and become a better player,” she said.
Next up for Pegula at the Dubai Tennis Championships is a semifinal clash against Mirra Andreeva or Amanda Anisimova. Pegula holds a 4-0 head-to-head lead against the latter and has yet to face the former.
