LATVIA’S Jelena Ostapenko, 20, beat No. 3 Simona Halep 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 at the French Open on Saturday to claim her first tour-level title.

Ranked only 47th, she was just two days past her 20th birthday.

“Before the match, 5-10 minutes, I was a little bit nervous,” said Ostapenko, the first Latvian to win a major. “But then, when I went on court, I felt quite free.”

Halep, a 25-year-old from Romania, was the 2014 French Open runner-up and would have moved up to No. 1 in the WTA rankings if she had won Saturday. She appeared headed for a runaway victory when up a set and 3-0 in the second, plus holding three break points for the chance to lead 4-0. But Ostapenko would not go quietly, winning that game and the next three en route to forcing a third set.

“I felt a little bit nervous,” said Ostapenko, the first woman since Jennifer Capriati in 2001 to win the French Open after losing the final’s opening set. “But then I felt: ‘I have nothing to lose, so I’m just going to enjoy the match and do my best.’”

She again summoned a veteran’s resolve down 3-1 in the third set, taking the match’s last five games and, fittingly, striking a pair of winners on the last two points.

“Enjoy, be happy, and keep it going,” Halep told Ostapenko during the trophy ceremony, “because you’re like a kid.”

Ostapenko was playing in only her eighth Grand Slam tournament and never had been past the third round before. Clay isn’t even her preferred surface — she likes grass better, and won the Wimbledon junior title in 2014 — which made this two-week joyride even more unpredictable.

Last year in Paris, Ostapenko lost in the first round. The year before that, she lost in the first round of qualifying.

“Everybody knows she can play very good, but I think nobody expected her to do what she did,” said Anabel Medina Garrigues, who began coaching Ostapenko in April.

Asked why Ostapenko never won a WTA Tour event until now, Medina Garrigues began answering, then interrupted herself after 10 words and laughed.

“I mean, I don’t know,” she said. “Actually, it’s something I cannot understand. It’s unbelievable.”

The last woman to win her first tour-level title at a major was Barbara Jordan at the 1979 Australian Open.

Ostapenko stepped into the considerable opening created by the absences of Serena Williams (who is pregnant) and Sharapova (denied a wild card after a drug ban). Also missing was two-time major champ Victoria Azarenka, while No. 1 Angelique Kerber lost in the first round.

Ostapenko burst onto the scene with a brash brand of tennis. Accenting shots with high-pitched exhales, she likes points quick. The impatience of youth not only showed up in Ostapenko’s play but also, occasionally, in her demeanor. When she’d miss, she would slap her thigh or crack her racket on the red clay or raise a palm as if to say, “What was up with that shot?” Things went her way to the tune of 54 winners, a remarkably high total that was 46 more than the defensive-minded Halep. Ostapenko also made 54 unforced errors, to Halep’s 10.

(SD-Agencies)