© Transylvania Open/ Twitter
It was a long wait for Elena-Gabriela Ruse that ended on Friday at the Transylvania Open. The Romanian ended a drought of more than two years by reaching the semi-final of the WTA tournament at her home nation. Against Emiliana Arango, Ruse took an hour and 45 minutes to post a 6-1, 0-6, 6-1 to make it to the semi-finals.
Across the first and third sets, Ruse was dominant when it came to winning first-serve points and points on second-serve return. In the first set, she lost only three of 16 points played on her first serve and in the final set, she won all but one of nine first-serve points played.
In that set, she also won 17 of 24 points on return on the Colombian’s second serve. In the first set, the return stat was much more dominant for Ruse as she won seven of eight points on Arango’s second-serve return.
Her game was quite shaky in the second set even as Arango made a strong comeback in the second set. She didn’t face any break point in the second set and converted three of six break points on Ruse’s serve. This semi-final finish is the first for the 26-year-old Ruse since she made it to the semi-final at the Palermo Ladies Open in 2021, en…
