By Julien Pretot
PARIS (Reuters) - Teenager Amanda Anisimova hopes the confidence she gained during her amazing run at the French Open will help her to succeed during the grasscourt season.
A day after bamboozling defending champion Simona Halep, the 17-year-old missed out on a place in the final after falling to a 6-7(4) 6-3 6-3 defeat to Australian Ashleigh Barty in a see-saw contest on Friday.
The first player born in the 2000s to reach a Grand Slam semi-final, Anisimova looked lost during a woeful start against eighth seed Barty.
"I started off pretty rough. I was kind of frozen and I couldn't really get into my game," she told reporters.
"And then when I was down 5-0, I just tried to keep the ball in the court, and then I went up in that set."
The fightback was not enough to carry her over the finishing line as Barty used her wealth of experience to tame an opponent who will break into the top 30 of the WTA rankings on Monday.
But Anisimova is taking a lot of positives from her French Open run.
"It's a positive week for me. I'm just going to try and be happy about the couple weeks, and hopefully today I'll be a little bit happier than I am right now," she said.
"I'm really excited about the grass season. I gained a lot of confidence in the past couple of weeks."
Anisimova, however, has no experience on grass at tour-level so she will be stepping into the unknown.
"I played junior Wimbledon one time and I lost, like, 13-11 in the third set or something," she said.
"Everyone tells me my game suits grass well, but that time I didn't leave thinking that.
"Hopefully, with a little bit more practice and getting
used to it, then maybe I can do well."
(Reporting by Julien Pretot; editing by Pritha Sarkar)