French Open Women's Betting: Back Halep to book her spot in the final

Back Halep to get to the final without dropping a set.

The stage is set in Paris and Abelson Info discuss which two stars will likely battle it out in the final on Saturday...

We're down to the final four in the French capital, with Maria Sharapova kicking things off in the first encounter as she prepares to face Eugenie Bouchard.

After coasting through the opening three rounds, things have become a little more difficult for the Russian seventh seed as she has been forced to go the distance by Sam Stosur and more recently, against Serena Williams' conqueror, Garbine Muguruza.

The former champion was again forced to fight back from the brink of elimination with a stunning comeback, and that will undoubtedly have given her the belief that she needs in order to go on and win the tournament having now gone 17-1 on clay this year.

However, her next opponent was also forced to produce a comeback, and despite her relatively young age, Bouchard is proving that she can handle the heat of the battle on the biggest of stages.

Having arrived off the back of her first WTA title, the Canadian starlet has improved from being a star for the future to a star of the present as she now celebrates a second consecutive Grand Slam semi-final.

Despite Carla Suarez Navarro being a real threat on clay, Bouchard held it together and came through a tough final set to prove that she has the temperament as well as the ability to go far in this game.

As soon as the semi-final line-up became clear, the media clambered over themselves to release an image taken years ago of a young Bouchard taking her picture with Sharapova, but she insists that while the pair aren't exactly friends off the court, she respects her rival as she was an inspiration in her early years.

Nevertheless, all that will be forgotten when the pair take to the court, and Sharapova will be buoyed by the fact that she has won their previous two meetings, including their last which was at the French Open last year.

However, Bouchard is now a completely different proposition, and we envisage this being a real battle between the two.

In the second semi-final one of our tournament tips has successfully made it through and Simona Halep has been simply brilliant thus far.

The Romanian star has yet to drop a set in the tournament after her straight-forward win over Svetlana Kuznetsova last time out, and she looks in really good form.

Andrea Petkovic would ordinarily be a tough test, but the way Halep is playing and breezing through the rounds at this point, it is difficult to see the German being able to stop her.

Halep leads their head-to-head record by two wins to one, beating her rival twice last year with her crowing moment coming on the clay in the final in Nurnberg.

As a result, back Halep to book her spot in the final as her remarkable run continues.

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