Hannah Klugman’s brilliant run at the French Open came to an end with defeat in the girls’ singles final, as Austria’s Lilli Tagger secured the junior title.
16-year-old Klugman, a former girls’ doubles runner-up in Wimbledon in 2023 and the Australian Open in January, was playing in her maiden grand slam singles final.
She was aiming to become the first British player since Michelle Tyler in 1976 to seal a junior title at Roland-Garros.
But despite an excellent run on an unfamiliar surface, including fighting back from a set down in both her quarter- and semi-final, Klugman had no answer to Tagger and lost 6-2, 6-0 earlier on Saturday.
An emotional Klugman, who shot to prominence as the winner of the prestigious Orange Bowl junior tournament aged 14, said, “It’s been a long week but I’m really proud of myself.”
Klugman had chances to break in the opening and seventh games of the first set, but could not capitalise on her opportunities and dropped serve in the fourth game.
Her 17-year-old opponent imposed herself from the baseline and an early break in the second set proved crucial as Klugman’s level dropped. She double faulted on break point down to concede another break for 4-0, with the Austrian – the junior world No. 47 compared to Klugman’s ranking of 13th – running away with the set to seal the title.
Wimbledon-born Klugman is one of Britain’s most promising juniors, and excelled in Paris despite having had had little experience on clay until a two-month stint practicing on the surface earlier this year, including a spell at the Rafael Nadal Academy.
She told BBC Sport that meeting the 14-time French Open champion had spurred her on. “He’s my idol – I love Rafa. He said some amazing things to me,” she said.
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“I struggled a bit last year and he said ‘as soon as you’ve got the level, everything will come. So just trust it and work hard every day’.”
