Eastbourne tennis: Madison Keys and Daria Kasatkina set up final showdown

Keys, who won her first ever WTA title in Eastbourne nine years ago, produced a stunning performance to defeat third seed and fellow American Coco Gauff 6-3 6-3.

It was a first grass court final in seven years for the US star, and a first final of 2023 after a mixed season to date.

Kasatkina also did not drop a set to make the final in Eastbourne for the first time, seeing off Camila Giorgi 6-2 7-5 to reach the second grass court final of her career.

Keys has won eight of the ten previous meetings between the two, but it was Kasatkina who prevailed when they met in Charleston earlier this season.

Meanwhile, rain disruption meant that the men’s final line-up is still to be decided.

Fourth seed Francisco Cerundolo is close to reaching his first grass court final, leading Mackenzie McDonald 2-6 7-5 5-2 in a match that will conclude first thing on Centre Court.

The winner of that will eventually face either Gregoire Barrere or second seed Tommy Paul, who will play their semi-final on Court 1 tomorrow.

Those matches will start at 11am, with the women’s final set to start not before 12.30pm and the men’s final not before 14.30pm.

Elsewhere, former Wimbledon champions Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic will head to SW19 in fine form after claiming the men’s doubles crown.

The Croatian pairing defeated Austin Krajicek and Ivan Dodig 6-4 6-2 to win their third title of 2023.

For the latest action on the British summer grass court season, check out the LTA website.

World No.8 Andy Lapthorne will play fellow Brit Greg Slade in Saturday’s quad singles wheelchair title decider at the LTA’s Rothesay International Eastbourne, while Lucy Shuker will attempt to avenge her women’s singles semi-final loss to world No.1 Diede de Groot when they meet again in the women’s doubles final.

Lapthorne, who won the title in 2022 when the quad singles draw was hosted at the Rothesay Classic Birmingham, eased past Gary Cox 6-0, 6-0 as he made his debut on the grass courts in Eastbourne. The 16-time Grand Slam champion said:

“It went really well. It’s always good to get more matches on grass. It’s my first time here in Eastbourne and it’s all good preparation for the next couple of weeks and trying to build towards Wimbledon. It’s all positive. I’ve been really well looked after (here), the people are great, and I’m really impressed by the event. It’s very blustery out there today and you do have to taper your expectations a bit and adapt with the shots that you’re playing, at times. Especially in the chair, if the ball moves late it’s very difficult to play a shot the way you’d want to. But again, this could happen at Wimbledon so it’s all good preparation. Hopefully tomorrow it will be a bit calmer.”

With Slade having also beaten Cox in straight sets in his opening round-robin match on Thursday, the top two ranked Brits will now go head-to-head before both head to The Championships, Wimbledon.

Shuker, De Groot and Jiske Griffioen are also working towards the third Grand Slam of the year and four-time Wimbledon champion De Groot’s 6-1, 6-2 semi-final win over British No.1 and world No.10 Shuker means that she will play 2016 Wimbledon champion Griffioen in an all-Dutch women’s singles final. World No.3 Griffioen marked her Eastbourne debut with a 6-1, 6-3 victory over China’s world No.5 Zhen Zhen Zhu.

Shuker and Zhu will also face De Groot and Griffioen in the women’s doubles final after the Dutch top seeds beat the all-British pairing of Ruby Bishop and Abbie Breakwell 6-0, 6-2.