PARIS — Lucie Safarova might still win a Grand Slam title at the French Open. Just not the biggest one.
She missed out on a first major when she lost Saturday’s final 6-3, 6-7 (2), 6-2 to Serena Williams. The match was heading toward an inevitable conclusion — with Williams leading 4-1 in the second set — and then became pulsating.
Safarova, a Czech player seeded 13th and playing in her first grand slam final, rallied so ferociously that she opened a 2-0 lead in the third set. But Williams responded by taking six games to clinch her 20th Grand Slam title.
"It was looking like it will be an easy match. I just pushed myself to step up the level," Safarova said. "She just stepped up her tennis again. She did some great shots to break me and started to play really strong."
Still, Safarova gets another chance on Sunday, when she teams up with American Bethanie Mattek-Sands in the women’s doubles final.
"I hope I will at least get one title here," a smiling Safarova said at her post-match news conference. "I will do my best."
That means getting plenty of rest.
"I will just have a nice family dinner and go to bed early and get ready," she said.
Seventh-seeded Safarova and Mattek-Sands face the 12th-seeded pairing of Casey Dellacqua of Australia and Yaroslava Shvedova of Ukraine.
The 28-year-old Safarova started her career strongly, reaching the quarterfinals of the Australian Open in 2007.
Then, for seven years, she never made it past the third round anywhere.
That was until last year, when her career picked up. She made it to the Wimbledon semifinals, and reached the fourth round here at Roland Garros and at the U.S. Open.
The momentum was halted at this year’s Australian Open, where she went out in the first round.
Her coach, Rob Steckley, said Safarova could get over-complacent at times.
"When she gets a little bit of belief, she gets a little bit comfortable. This is something we’ve been working on and we would like to keep getting better at," Steckley said, adding that Williams’ ability to turn situations around quickly showed her mental fortitude.
"This is what Serena does best," Steckley said. "It’s just she is not afraid of intimidating the other player with whatever way she can."
Still, given Safarova’s dynamic performance at Roland Garros — where she did not drop a set before the final — the expectation levels will be higher at Wimbledon.
The player welcomes the pressure.
"I hope it’s a nice problem," Safarova said. "I’m just really satisfied with the way I fought and played here, and it’s something I will take for the future tournaments."