The WTA Wuhan Open 2019 draw was released on Saturday with some of the top names in action during the tournament. How does the Wuhan Open draw look like? Here’s more.
The final Premier 5 event of the season will be hosting eight of the Top 20 WTA players: Ashleigh Barty, Karolina Pliskova, Elina Svitolina, Simona Halep, Petra Kvitova, Kiki Bertens, Belinda Bencic and Wang Qiang, with each of them eyeing for this esteemed prize that will award them 900 ranking points.
The event is especially important for world No.1, Barty and world No.2 Pliskova.
Barty will need to stay in the competition till at least the third round to retain her newly gained spot with Pliskova eyeing a victory to clinch the world No.1 spot from the Aussie.
It will be interesting to see how the players compete because Barty has had a spectacular season emerging as the champion at Roland Garros and losing only eight times in the past 11 months.
Similarly, Pliskova has been playing brilliantly winning the Italian Open.
The most recent face-off between the top seeds was at the Miami Open, where Barty beat Pliskova in the finals. Interestingly, both players have won six of their past ten matches and lie at a point difference of just 321 points.
The Wuhan Open will also feature Venus Williams, Petra Kvitova and defending champion Aryna Sabalenka, who are all former winners. Aryna Sabalenka will play against Aliaksandra Sasnovich in the first round and if through to the second, she will play either Venus Williams or Danielle Collins.
Angelique Kerber will be up against her 2016 Olympic final opponent, Monica Puig in round one whose winner will play Wang Qiang.
Donna Vekic will be playing Former world No.1 Victoria Azarenka in the first round.
Petra Kvitova would face either Jessica Pegula or Polona Hercog and if through to round 3, could face Sloane Stephens, who is seeded 14th in the tournament.
There is a probable chance of a quarterfinal faceoff between Barty/Bencic, Halep/Bertens, Wang/Svitolina and Kvitova/Pliskova only if the players manage to defeat their other formidable opponents.
Sabalenka, Stosur, Halep, Sasnovich and Garcia, to name a few, will also be playing in the doubles category. Mixed doubles, US Open winner, Bethanie Mattek-Sands will partner with Caroline Garcia for their round of 32 match tomorrow and could possibly meet Stosur and Zhang for their next round.
These will make for interesting matches with the world’s best players competing for the title.
The round of 64 matches at the 2019 Wuhan Open kick-start on September 22.
Potential 3rd Round Match-Ups at 2019 Wuhan Open:
- Barty v Kenin
- Bencic v Keys
- Halep v Vekic
- Bertens v Sabalenka
- Wang v Kerber
- Svitolina Wozniacki
- Kvitova v Stephens
- Pliskova v Sevastova
I honestly believe that any of the WTA tournaments in which Kvitova’s been entered into as a participant is hers to win without a doubt. If she’s performing at her highest maximum level of play then she’s most likely going to beat everyone that she faces regardless of her opponents ranking or past accomplishments.
Nonetheless, I won’t deny the fact that she’s rarely if ever playing at a consistently high enough level in order to maintain a lengthy period of completie and total dominant stranglehold over the rest of the players on the WTA tour. However, I wouldn’t necessarily say that I’ve given up on her just yet especially since she’s truly never quite as of yet reached her peak level of play thus far into her tennis career and I believe that once she’s managed to do so and figures out how to consistently perform at her very best then she’s going to essentially become an unstoppable juggernaut of a force out there on court and nobody’s going to be able to slow her down let alone even think about knocking her off for a very long time.