ATX Open: Marta Kostyuk and Varvara Gracheva in their first career finals
ATX Open: Marta Kostyuk and Varvara Gracheva have advanced to their first career finals. Kostyuk and Gracheva have entered the final of the ATX Open after defeating Daniel Collins and Katy Wolinets respectively in their semi-finals.
![ATX Open: Marta Kostyuk and Varvara Gracheva in their first career finals](https://www.swarajyatimes.in/uploads/images/202303/image_870x_64047d59c15f9.jpg)
The ATX Open looks set to have a new WTA singles champion as Marta Kostyuk and Varvara Gracheva advance to their first career finals. Kostyuk and Gracheva entered the final after defeating Daniel Collins and Katy Wolineets in their semifinals respectively. In the first semi-final, Ukraine's eighth seed Kostyuk defeated fourth seed Collins of America 6-4, 6-3. The 20-year-old Kostyuk has reached her last four semi-finals at the tour level but was unable to advance beyond that.
Kostyuk won his first match against 2022 Australian Open finalist Collins here in 84 minutes. He broke Collins four times in seven break points and lost only once.
In the second semi-final, 22-year-old Gracheva defeated 21-year-old Volinets 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 in a three-set clash to reach the final. Despite trailing 2–4 in the deciding set, Gracheva won four games in a row to finish the match in two hours and 24 minutes.
World number five Caroline Garcia stormed into her second final of the season with a 6-3, 6-4 victory over fourth seed Elise Mertens in the semi-finals of the Monterrey Open. She will take on Croatia's Donna Vekic, who made it to her first final of 2023 after defeating China's Zhu Lin.
Vekich has won five of his nine meetings against Garcia. Their last meeting was at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. Garcia hit 33 winners against Mertens of Belgium. While Mertens could only hit 17 winners. Mertens struggled under the constant pressure of Garcia. The 29-year-old Garcia has reached her second Monterrey final.