The Malaysian Open, also known as Alya Malaysian Open for sponsorship reasons, is an International women’s tennis tournament played on the WTA Tour. And below, we will provide you with daily Malaysian Open tips and predictions for the 2018 edition of the competition.
It is played on outdoor hard courts in the month of February every season and is attended by some of the most prominent female players on the circuit. Up until 2016, the event was sponsored by BMW before making the shift to Alya in 2017.
The 2018 Malaysian Open will be the ninth edition of the tournament and is set to start on February 26th. The event will take place at Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club in Kuala Lumpur.
Malaysian Open Live Streaming Options Here
The defending champion is the 21-year-old Australian Ashleigh Barty, who defeated the Japanese Nao Hibino in the final to lift the very first title of her career. It was nothing short of a dream run for Barty, who won the tournament while dropping only one set en route to the ultimate victory.
What makes her story even more inspiring is the fact that she started her run in the Malaysian Open as a qualifier. One could also say that luck favored her the most, considering how she managed to avoid meeting any of the seeded players in the course of the tournament.
She was placed in the same half as Carla Suarez Navarro and Caroline Garcia, both of whom failed to move past the first round. Even the then-defending champion and the formidable, Elina Svitolina came to Kuala Lumpur as the top seed. However, she was forced to withdraw in the second round itself owing to an injury.
In addition to this, Barty also won the doubles part of the Malaysian Open, partnering up with her compatriot Casey Dellacqua.
Buy Malaysian Open Tickets Here
With that remarkable achievement of hers, she joined the exclusive club of players who won the singles and doubles title of the same tournament in the same season. The young Australian entered the tournament as the World No. 158, but following her win, she moved into the top 100.
The rest of her season was quite uneventful, except for a couple of runners-up feat in big events like Wuhan Open and WTA Birmingham. She managed to move into the top 30 after these feats. Given the way her form has developed, it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine her defending her title successfully in 2018 WTA Kuala Lumpur.
The list of the players for the 2018 edition will be revealed in the coming months. Considering how the tournament’s management has roped in high profile players over the years, we can definitely expect the upcoming edition to be quite exciting and thrilling.
Get the latest Malaysian Open tips, predictions and odds below.