Australian Open: Svitolina storms into semis following remarkable return from motherhood

Even sky is not the limit for the marauding Ukrainian Elina Svitolina, as she scythed her way through to the Australian Open semi-finals for the first time in her illustrious career.

The mother of one – her three-year-old daughter is named Skai – and the wife of tennis showman Gael Monfils, the 31-year-old was in rampaging form against American third seed Coco Gauff, winning 6-1, 6-2 in under an hour.

With husband Monfils – who is on his farewell tour this year – watching on, the 12^th seed and former world No 3 was clearly on another level under a closed roof on Rod Laver Arena. Her reward is a clash with imperious world number one Sabalenka, after the Belarusian overpowered American teenager Iva Jovic for the loss of just three games.

"Very, very pleased with the tournament so far," said Svitolina, who is on a 10-match win streak after a title-winning run at Auckland this month.

Making the semi-finals will also propel her back into the top 10.

"It's always been my dream to come back after maternity leave to make the top 10. Always been my goal," she said.

"It means the world to me. And of course I try to push myself, I try to give myself this motivation to continue. Very pleased with the performance at this tournament in Australia."

In 2022, Svitolina took a break from professional tennis to give birth to her first child, as her ranking plummeted to 236. The Ukrainian made a strong comeback upon her return to competition in 2023, winning a WTA Tour title and reaching the French Open quarter-finals and the Wimbledon semi-finals (beating then world No 1 Iga Swiatek in the latter) in her first few tournaments back.

That was her second semi-final appearance at Wimbledon after 2019, the year in which she also made the US Open last four.

On Thursday, Svitolina will be hoping to go where she has never gone before, as she takes on the world’s best player.