The Map of Myrrh: how Andreeva became the champion of Roland Garros

Mirra Andreeva became the champion of Roland Garros, winning the Grand Slam tournament final on her first attempt. In the final of Roland Garros, the eighth racket of the world beat Polish Maya Khvalinskaya in two sets — 6:3, 6:2. In general, it is largely symbolic that Andreeva won on the ground in Paris. Her first winning matches at WTA tournaments were on this surface (Madrid-2023), her first title was won on clay (Iasi-2024), her first great success in doubles (Olympic silver-2024) came on these courts. The first semi—final at the Majors also happened here, again in 2024.

Fairy tale and prospects

This season, Mirra was unable to defend last year's two thousandth titles, won on hard court (in Dubai and Indian Wells), winning only one match there. Then Andreeva barely managed to stay in the top ten, but with the transition to the ground, the situation changed dramatically. Having asked for a wild card for the 500th in Linz, the Russian won the title there, then reached the semi-finals of Stuttgart, the final of Madrid and the quarterfinals of Rome. Mirra lost in these matches to serious rivals — Elena Rybakina in Germany, Marta Kostyuk in Spain (who then also reached the semifinals of Roland Garros) and Coco Gauff in Italy, she was the current champion of the Parisian major at that time.

And Andreeva played much more confidently and calmly than in most tournaments at the beginning of the season. I no longer had such nerves, a lot of mistakes, and frustratingly lost endings of intense fights. By the way, in this regard, we need to recall the match with Anna Bondar in the 1/8 finals of Madrid. Mirra led 5-1 in the deciding set, missed the matchball, lost five games in a row, but managed not to fall apart and put the squeeze on the Hungarian in a tiebreak. There are no small things in sports, and it is quite possible that it was that victory that set Andreeva's mindset for the rest of the clay season.

But let's return from the past events to the present. Mirra went into her first major final match of her career against an opponent who had no experience at all playing in the decisive stages of tournaments at a level above the Challengers. Before this Paris Slam, Maya Khvalinskaya's best result was the quarterfinals of Cluj-Napoca in February of this year, which she reached through qualifying, just like here. Of course, the 24-year—old Polish woman's appearance in the final of Roland Garros is an absolute sensation, one of those fabulous stories that sometimes happen in sports. Maya held the tournament of her life, won (including qualifying matches) nine matches in a row on these courts and secured her debut not only in the top 100, but also in the top 30! More precisely, after defeating Diana Schneider in the semifinals, Khvalinska soared to 21st place in the live rating, and if she had become a champion, she would have reached the top 15.

Andreeva, however, became the sixth in any final, ahead of Elina Svitolina at the end of Roland Garros and Gauff, who did not defend the title here. However, 700 points for winning the title match meant that she would get very close to Amanda Anisimova and Jessica Pegula, and would also be less than 1,000 points away from Igi Sventek. At the same time, the Polish woman will have to defend her title at Wimbledon in just three weeks (2000 points), and with her current form, the big question is how far she can go on a grass Slam. Another pleasant moment was that Mirra's victory gave her the lead in the Championship race, and with 418 points of advantage over the second Arina Sobolenko. As a reminder, only the points scored this season are counted there.

Everyone said she had to win.

Two things became clear from the very first games of the final. Firstly, both of them are very worried — however, it was quite logical and expected. Secondly, all Maya's half-candles from defense, with which she so effectively tormented both Anna Kalinskaya and Diana Schneider, and the rivals before them, are not very useful with Myrrh. Andreeva confidently went to these balls, adjusted well to the rebound, worked well with her feet and either shot straight through or made mistakes from Khvalinskaya.

After four consecutive break exchanges, where nerves were clearly showing (Mirra even made a double mistake on a break point at 2-1), the Polish broke such an unsuccessful series by winning a serve at zero - and this turned out to be her last success in the set. Andreeva entered the game, mastered her nerves and almost stopped giving points with mistakes, but Khvalinskaya failed to do so. Against this background, the difference in class became obvious, and Mirra turned 2:3 into 6:3.

Nothing changed in the second set. Mirra kept pushing and hitting, Maya kept making mistakes. With 2-0 in her favor, Andreeva also pulled serve from a triple break point, taking a huge step towards the final chord of this match. Minor problems appeared only at the very end, when the 19-year-old Russian was already leading 5-0. Khvalinska avoided the "steering wheel", then Andreeva hurried and made mistakes when serving for the match, but immediately after losing her game, she finished the final with a break to zero!

"It's a great victory, it's history," Olympic champion and former world number one in doubles Elena Vesnina told Izvestia. — I am incredibly happy for Mirra, for how she handled this tournament in France and this final. It seems to me that the pressure of the whole world was on her. Because everyone said she had to win. It's very difficult when you're burdened with such responsibility, and you're only 19 years old. But Mirra showed character, played very cleverly and competently.

At the award ceremony, the Russian woman beamed with happiness and thanked literally everyone, including her psychologist from the United States and children's coach Kirill Kryukov, whom she addressed in Russian.

The seventh Russian

Mirra became the seventh player from Russia to win the Slam in singles. Before her, Anastasia Myskina, Maria Sharapova and Svetlana Kuznetsova won among women, while Evgeny Kafelnikov, Marat Safin and Daniil Medvedev won among men. Sharapova became the best of these six in terms of the number of titles at the majors, with five of them, including two in Paris. By the way, except for her, none of the Russians managed to win the same Grand Slam tournament twice.

Andreeva is also the youngest champion of Roland Garros since 1992, when 18-year-old Monica Seles took the lead here. By the way, Seles won the RG for the first time (and the Major in general) at 16 years and 189 days, making her the second youngest Slam champion in the Open Era after Martina Hingis (16 years and 117 days). Myrrh entered the top ten in this list, winning at 19 years and 38 days. Before that, Kuznetsova was tenth, having won the 2004 US Open at 19 years and 76 days old. And in the 21st century, only Sharapova (17 years and 75 days at Wimbledon 2004) and Emma Raducanu (18 years and 302 days at the US Open 2021) were younger than Andreeva.

—Mirra is doing well," two—time Olympic champion Vyacheslav Fetisov told Izvestia. — It would seem that she recently broke into the tennis elite and forced herself to be talked about from the very first steps. Finally, she won her first slam. We will continue to be happy for her. She has character, and she has already proved everything else. She has all the ingredients to join the cohort of great tennis players not only in our country.

If Mirra maintains this momentum for the second half of the season, she may well make her debut in the top 3 rankings soon. We will not talk about the fight for the first place yet, although the leadership in the Championship race in the middle of the year hints that such an opportunity exists. Well, at the finish of the season, Andreeva should definitely make her debut at the Final WTA Singles Championship this time, unlike last year, when Elena Rybakina beat her at the last turn.