PARIS, June 5, 2017

Kristina Mladenovic of France thrilled the home crowd at Roland Garros with the biggest win of her career, knocking out defending champion Garbiñe Muguruza of Spain, 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 on Sunday, to advance into the last eight of the French Open.

Backed by the French supporters, the 13th seed won 70 per cent of her first service points and broke serve six times to secure victory in just under two hours of play.

“I couldn’t really find my game, but I don’t think I did really something wrong out there,” Muguruza told during an emotional post match press conference. “You know, I just think it went to her side, and that’s all. There was a few points that she played well at the end of the match, and kind of that was it.”

When the Spaniard was asked about Mladenovic yelling “Forza” after her errors, she broke down in tears and the moderator let her leave the press room. After a short break she responded:

“I think she speaks like 25 languages, I heard, so…”

Muguruza scoldingly wagged a finger at the crowd on Suzanne Lenglen when she was leaving the court.

Defending champ Muguruza falls, and admonishes the pro-Kiki crowd on her way to the locker room. #RG17 pic.twitter.com/CzxzPVoPvu

— Chris Oddo (@TheFanChild) 4. Juni 2017

Did Muguruza feel that the specatators were disrespectful?

“I think the audience was really tough today. I can’t really understand. I don’t know how to explain. If you had been in my shoes on the court, I think you would have understood. I don’t know what people were expecting. I’d rather not say anything more.”

Mladenovic told that she also had to cope with the atmosphere on court.

“Yeah, the crowd, I mean, you know, I’m French. I’m playing at home. Obviously they are excited. The atmosphere was just amazing, I thought that it was not easy to handle for both of us. There is a lot of pressure. Even for me, I had like a thousand people screaming and cheering up for me, it’s not easy to control the nerves and the pressure and everything,” Mladenovic stated.

She will next take on Timea Bacsinszky from Switzerland, who knocked out 10th seed Venus Williams of the United States.