French Open 2026: Cobolli, Berrettini power into last eight; Shnaider, Kalinskaya advance

PARIS: Roland Garros felt like it was exhaling on Monday, the sun soft and the air cool, an interlude after last week’s heatwave. Rain is forecast in the days ahead.Flavio Cobolli, however, was not afforded the same comfort. The 10th seed had all but sealed his fourth-round match against American Zachary Svajda before nerves crept in, his serve wavered and the contest began to tilt.Yet just when the match appeared to be turning against him, the Italian found another gear, rallying from 0-4 and 1-5 down in the fourth set to prevail 6-2, 6-3, 6-7 (3), 7-6 (5) and reach the second Grand Slam quarterfinal of his career after last year’s Wimbledon.Speaking on court afterwards, Cobolli, who has long labelled Roland Garros his favourite Slam, confessed he was “almost s***ting my pants” during the match’s most tense moments.Cobolli dragged himself back into the fourth set in characteristic style, breaking the 23-year-old Svajda, making his Roland Garros main-draw debut, in the very first game.“We Italians are born on clay, and we have the best feeling on this surface,” Cobolli said of the clay court major. “When the match is almost done, you start to think of it, and that's the problem with my character. I just want to play, play my best tennis possible. But if I think about it, especially if I'm nervous, I start to play a different tennis, and of course the Chatrier is not easy for everyone. The court was tough.”Midway through the set the Italian stirred the fightback.“I tried to stay a little bit positive. I was starting to be a little bit nervous, also with my team,” Cobolli said of his battle to gain control. “I tried to play my tennis, to play as hard as possible, and I also started taking my time because I was also with a little bit less energy from the other three sets. Then I just played my tennis without thought, and at the end, it worked.”Cobolli will go up against the fourth-seed Felix Auger-Aliassime, who powered into his first quarter-final in Paris with a 6-3, 7-5, 6-1 win over Chile’s Alejandro Tabilo.In another last-16 encounter, Matteo Berrettini marked his return to the quarter-finals of a major for the first time since 2022 with a 6-3, 7-6 (2), 7-6 (6) win over Juan Manuel Cerundolo.Schnaider downs KeysDiana Shnaider, the 22-year-old bandana-sporting Russian, booked her place in a first Grand Slam quarterfinal after a three-set battle with Madison Keys on Court Suzanne-Lenglen on Monday.The 25th seed, who took the collegiate route into the professional game, overcame 19th-seeded Keys, the 2025 Australian Open champion, 6-3, 3-6, 6-0. In doing so, Shnaider reversed three previous defeats to the American and set up a meeting with either world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka or four-time major winner Naomi Osaka, who contested the night session on Monday.Earlier, Anastasia Potapova and Anna Kalinskaya played out another tight fourth-round contest, with Kalinskaya finishing strongest. Striking a series of decisive forehands, she edged a third-set tiebreak to win 6-4, 2-6, 7-6 (7) and reach her first Roland Garros quarterfinal.Kalinskaya, who arrived in Paris with just one win from her previous four appearances, will next face qualifier Maja Chwalińska, the world No. 114, for a place in the last four.