In what was easily her most complete performance since falling to Petra Kvitova in the 2014 Wimbledon Final, Eugenie Bouchard used her improved play to get past one of the hottest players on the WTA Tour on Friday evening in Wuhan, China. Her 6-2, 6-3 semi-final win over Caroline Wozniacki will give the young Canadian another shot at the two-time Wimbledon Champion in tomorrow's finale of the 2014 Wuhan Open

After struggling to find her game for the better part of the past three months, the twenty year old once again looked like the dominant player who has taken the women's game by storm since her surprising semi-final appearance at the 2014 Australian Open. While it was far from a perfect performance, she used a powerful ground game and strong serve to overpower the twenty-four year old Danish star. Outside of her opening round struggles against, the No. 6 seed had a fairly routine path into the semis but was by no means the favourite coming into this one. 

Considering how well Wozniacki has played since her run to the final of the 2014 US Open, had Bouchard been able to simply make a match of it and continue to show improvement in her overall game, her camp would have been more than satisfied with a semi-final appearance in Wuhan. Instead what we saw unfold was a performance that was reminiscent of what we saw from her at both the French Open and Wimbledon. After a couple of sloppy opening games to start the match, the Canadian No. 1 pushed Wozniacki all over the court and despite her best efforts to turn the tide…there was absolutely nothing she could do to slowdown her opponent. No matter what she threw at her, "Genie" always had a response.

For the first time since Wimbledon, Bouchard looked like the confident player who was almost daring the other players on tour to come at her for what was the better part of the 2014 WTA Calendar As good as her groundstrokes were, it was her success at the net which was the biggest surprise of all, winning thirteen of fourteen points to book her ticket into her third final of the season.

Since winning her second Wimbledon crown back in early July, Kvitova has also had a rather up and down end to her summer but she has been in fine form in Wuhan. The No.3 seed looked rock-solid in dismissing youngster Elina Svitolina 6-3, 7-5 to reach the final but unlike her counterpart, she did not have to face a fellow Top Ten seed along the way. 

Having played as well as she did against Wozniacki should work in Eugenie Bouchard’s favour but considering how one-sided her clash with Kvitova at the All England Club was, it is a boost of confidence she can definitely use heading into the final.

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About the author
Rob Soria
Rob covers the ATP Tour and Toronto Blue Jays for VAVEL USA