Marta Kostyuk may have some regrets after her defeat to Mirra Andreeva in the Roland Garros semi-finals.
Kostyuk was comfortably beaten by Andreeva 6-1, 6-3, preventing her from becoming the first Ukrainian woman to reach a Grand Slam final.
This also brought an end to her 17-match unbeaten run on clay, with Kostyuk claiming the courts suited Andreeva better than her.
While the conditions on Court Philippe-Chatrier may not have helped Kostyuk, she has also been told that she kept making a mistake against Andreeva that could have cost her.
Chris Evert and Anne Keothavong tell Marta Kostyuk what she did wrong vs Mirra Andreeva
When reacting to the Roland Garros semi-final live on TNT Sports, former British number one Anne Keothavong claimed that Kostyuk kept playing into Andreeva’s backhand, which she believes is her strength.
“The thing Marta Kostyuk did not quite get right, I just felt she was overplaying Andreeva’s backhand,” said Keothavong. “I could not quite understand why she was going into Andreeva’s backhand so much. It’s her strength! She is very comfortable using that shot.
“She is very good at changing direction. I thought Kostyuk got stuck in the backhand cross court battle too long at times, she needed to find a way to get into the forehand cross court battle, but she left it too little too late.”
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Tim Henman then joined the conversation and claimed that Andreeva did not allow Kostyuk to get into many of her service games, which allowed her to be more aggressive on return and break the Ukrainian five times in the match.
“I think the reality is when you are holding serve that comfortably it frees you up on your return games to be even more aggressive,” added Henman.
“For Kostyuk, she is thinking wow. I am getting no looks in on her serve, she had a few break points but was not able to take one until midway through the second set. It puts more and more pressure on your own serve and that tone was set in the first set for Andreeva to win it 6-1.”
Seven-time Grand Slam champion Chris Evert also spoke about the serve, but instead highlighted Kostyuk’s serve as a weakness in the match against Andreeva, which she claimed was ‘disappointing’.
“She could not hold her serve,” Evert said about Kostyuk. “She held serve so beautifully against Swiatek and Svitolina, but she just did not take care of what she should have taken care of and had control over. It was disappointing. Her A game was not there.
“But I have been there before, 14 days in a row, you have to have your A game and you can’t have dips. But I have to relate, a lot of people out there wonder why she is not playing well when she played so well this tournament.
“Let me tell you, she was not fresh, emotionally or mentally, it just wasn’t there for her. And Mirra played all out. This was her day. She played out of her mind. She can’t play any better.”
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What is next for Marta Kostyuk?
Despite a disappointing end to Roland Garros, it has still been a very impressive clay court season for Kostyuk, who lost just one match on the surface this year.
Kostyuk will now be rewarded with a new career-high ranking of world number 12, but she is scheduled to return to the match court in the coming days.
The Ukrainian is entered into the Queen’s Club Championships next week, where Kostyuk is set to be the fifth seed behind Elena Rybakina, Amanda Anisimova, Victoria Mboko and Belinda Bencic.
Queen’s is the only grass court tournament that Kostyuk has entered ahead of Wimbledon this year, but she has just days to prepare for the WTA 500 tournament.
The 2026 Queen’s Club Championships will begin on Monday, June 8, and will also feature the return of Serena Williams, who is playing doubles with Mboko in London.