Eva Lys gave her little sister a kiss, then threw her arms around her mother’s neck. The Hamburg native continued her incredible journey at the Australian Open and made history in the process. As the first female “lucky loser” in the history of the tournament in Melbourne, she managed to reach the round of 16.
Lys beat Romanian Jaqueline Cristian 4:6, 6:3, 6:3 in the third round and will now face world number two Iga Swiatek from Poland. The Hamburg player needed 2:25 hours in a hard-fought game before she scored her second match point. The 23-year-old has played against Swiatek once so far – in Stuttgart in 2022 she had no chance in two sets.
Before the game against Cristian, Lys explained that she was going into it “just as relaxed as in the other matches,” but still knowing that she had “a great chance.” At the beginning, however, the world number 128. miss the carefree attitude that had carried her through the previous tournament. The clever Cristian efficiently used even the Germans’ smaller mistakes to win the set.
Lys was much more active in the third set than Cristian
However, in the midday heat of Melbourne, Lys was the better player afterwards. While Cristian, number 82 in the world, began to struggle, Lys now seemed relaxed and hit significantly more winners than her opponent. After winning the set in the second round, she showed her fist.
The same picture emerged in the decision-making process. Lys was the more active player, grabbed an early break and marched to her biggest career success.
Lys had a crazy day on Monday. It was only 15 minutes before her first round match that the 23-year-old found out that she was even allowed to take part in the tournament as a “lucky loser”. She then played freely and clearly beat local hero Kimberly Birrell in two sets. She then retained the upper hand in the close second round match against Varvara Gracheva from France in three sets.