SYDNEY (Reuters) - While millions of their compatriots will stay up late into the night to watch Ash Barty try and win the French Open on Saturday, her parents will be stranded just a couple of hundred miles away from Roland Garros. That will not, of course, diminish their pride at Barty's astonishing run to the final, where she will be aiming to bring Australia its first French Open women's singles title in 46 years. Since swapping bat for racket again in 2016, Barty has risen from 325th to eighth in the world going into the French Open, a ranking that will improve to second if she beats Czech Vondrousova. Barty reached the final of her first tournament of the year in Sydney and her first Grand Slam quarter-final at the Australian Open two weeks later. "I'm just proud of myself the way I was able to fight and scrap and hang in there and find a way," she told reporters in Paris.

Source: The Star June 08, 2019 06:00 UTC