WTA Palermo: Pandemic Preview

Tennis is finally back. Not in full strength, but at least the WTA tour is up and running again with the imminent International event in Palermo, Italy. Unfortunately, COVID-19 is still present and we only got reminded yesterday when a player not officially named (arguably Viktoriya Tomova as she pulled out of qualifying) tested positive.

It's always tricky to pick outrights and in times like these, there are even more incalculables. Anyway, the excitement for actual pro tennis is real and so I'm trying to find value in this week's draw.

Martic vs. Belgium

Petra Martic and Marketa Vondrousova are the two top seeds in Palermo. Both are inside the WTA top 20, but we have a very open field overall. The eight seeded players are all within #15 and #27 of the rankings.

Sitting on top of the draw, Croatian Petra Martic plays Alison Van Uytvanck in the first round. The Belgian, just as her girlfriend Greet Minnen who already lost in qualifying, prefers faster courts. The same goes for their compatriot Kirsten Flipkens, who has to beat a qualifier to face Martic in round two.

So while the first two rounds seem manageable for top seed Martic, the other eighth is loaded. We have Kasatkina facing Paolini in round one with the winner being scheduled to play #5 seed Elise Mertens in round two. Italian Jasmine Paolini won an exhibition tournament at the end of June, but her draw could not be any harder. With Martic, Mertens and Kasatkina all in one quarter, I'll stay away from any outrights here.

Fun fact, the three Belgians already qualified for the main draw are all allocated in the first quarter and Martic's path could look like that: Van Uytvanck, Flipkens, Mertens.

The second quarter has Anett Kontaveit and Donna Vekic as seeded players. Both have feasible draws with Tig and Rus and I don't see them having too much trouble in their second round matches either. Siegemund, Begu, Hercog and talented youngster Cocciaretto are the other players in that quarter and while all of them can cause bigger names trouble on a given day, I think both Kontaveit and Vekic will prove too much for them.

Kontaveit enters the tournament with renewed confidence as she beat Ostapenko and Sevastova at home in Tallinn a few days ago. The exhibition called "Merko Cup" was played indoors though, so she will have to adapt to clay courts again. Vekic on the contrary has trained a lot on clay recently, including sessions with Sakkari or Wozniacki at her residence in Monte Carlo. She looks fit and ready to go and at 16/1, I like the Croatian on the outright market.

Of Exho Goddesses and Pop Queens

One of the closest first round matchups should be the one on top of the third quarter. #8 seed Ekaterina Alexandrova is facing Kristina Mladenovic. The latter put in a lot of work during quarantine, but also had some tough losses against Paquet and Ferro (twice) in exhibition matches. Her opponent lives and studies in Prague, so she competed in the "Tipsport Elite Trophy" in Czechia. In very mixed results, she beat Vondrousova, but lost to Martincova and the Pliskova sisters (Kristyna twice).

Mixed results is something that does not apply to their potential second round opponent Fiona Ferro. The Frenchwoman put up a perfect 10-0 record in exhibitions, beating Mladenovic and Cornet among others. She's a good and solid clay courter that still flies a bit under the radar, but the 20/1 odds offered seem about right considering her not-so-easy draw.

Maria Sakkari is the #3 seed and a player I would love to back in this tournament. The Greek is one of the fittest players on tour, which should benefit her in the Italian heat, especially after such a long hiatus. She's playing Kristyna Pliskova in round one before facing the winner of Sara Errani and Sorana Cirstea. I do like Sakkari here, but am a bit hesitant because of the rather low odds at 8/1.

In the fourth quarter, there are a lot of unknowns. Starting with the biggest one, #7 seed Dayana Yastremska tried to express her thoughts about all the conflicts we currently live through, with negligible success. The Ukrainian also recorded pop songs and had video shoots, so all we know is that she's still the controversial girl we already knew pre-Corona. Her talent as a tennis player is undeniable, but I won't be surprised if she loses to Sara Sorribes Tormo in her first round match. The Spaniard is another one that went undefeated in exhibitions. No major names, but wins against Arruabarrena (twice) or Bucsa underline her abilities on clay courts.

Talking about unknowns, we also have two qualifiers in the fourth quarter and there are some more interesting names in the draw such as Kostyuk, Samsonova or Juvan. Tamara Zidansek and #2 seed Marketa Vondrousova will be facing qualifiers in their opening rounds.

The one matchup missing is the one between Camila Giorgi and Rebecca Peterson. The Swede only came back from rehab a few weeks ago and with Giorgi, you never know what you get. That only aggravates on clay, where she didn't compete for more than two years. I don't have any strong opinions on the two of them.

Vondrousova, together with Zidansek, should be the most solid player in that quarter, but I wouldn't touch an outright at 6/1 or worse, so I'll pass on the Czech. As mentioned, Zidansek will play a qualifier in round one. The Slovenian is a very solid clay courter and I kinda like her number at 50/1 with bet365, but I also think she can be outplayed by the likes of Samsonova or Kostyuk. So I'll wait for the qualifiers to be allocated and might go for another long shot tomorrow. For now, I do take Sakkari as my second half pick.

Edit: So Sakkari just lost her first round match to a very well playing Kristyna Pliskova, resulting in the third quarter opening up quite a bit. As I mentioned above, I really like the progress of Fiona Ferro and strangely enough, her odds only increased from 20/1 to 28/1. That's more than enough for me to take with the top seed already being out of her quarter.