French Open Women - Battle of the Barboras

Fantastic Fights

A lot has been talked about these autumn conditions in Paris, and rightfully so as it's a whole new experience for players at this level. The courts and new balls present a completely different task compared to previous French Opens. The rainy and windy weather slows down the courts even more and makes for some fantastic fights like the matches between Chardy and Rodionov, Delbonis and Londero, Moutet and Giustino or Sandgren and Hurkacz, which all went to 10 or more games in the deciding fifth set. On the women's side, Muguruza won a close match against Zidansek yesterday while youngster Clara Tauson beat Jennifer Brady 9-7 in the fifth today.

Battle of the Barboras

We stay on the women's side for the second round match between Barbora Strycova and Barbora Krejcikova who will meet for the first time (in singles) tomorrow. The two Czechs played some exhibition events at home this summer and especially Krejcikova produced some positive results. She also offered Simona Halep a good fight in the WTA tournament in Prague, which led to bookies and the market giving her a lot of respect. However she lost to Renata Zarazua and Miriam Kolodziejova in her next two ITF 25k tournaments as a rather big favorite.

In the first round of Roland Garros, Krejcikova beat Nina Stojanovic 6-3 7-5 while Strycova outplayed Varvara Lepchenko 7-5 6-2. Both wins were solid but expected. Tomorrow's game will be different for both of them as Strycova plays with more variety than Stojanovic and Krejcikova has more power to her game than Lepchenko. So a lot will depend on who is able to adapt better, not only to the conditions but also to their opponent.

Counting on Consistency

Krejcikova's groundstrokes are big and she is able to hit through the court. However, on these muddy courts, we already saw that you have to go for a little extra power to end points. And herein lies the problem for the youger Czech as she's still inconsistent at times. Strycova possesses some more variety and also uses the drop shot pretty often, which is one of the most important shots to have in your repertoire in these conditions as first round matches revealed.

So with Strycova being more experienced and having the advantage in a cat and mouse kind of game, I could see the conditons favoring her in this particular matchup. She was "happy to beat someone who played 3 qualifying matches" which should boost her confidence as well. If Krejcikova is not on top of her game, I give the edge to Strycova and therefore take her to win this domestic affair at 1.80 odds.