The first round matches at the WTA Korea Open 2019 will kick-start on Monday, September 16 with four of the top eight seeds in action on the day. And if you are looking for the Maria Sakkari v Patricia Tig & Karolina Muchova v Alison van Uytvanck tips and predictions with their previews.
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Maria Sakkari v Patricia Tig Preview
The top-seeded Maria Sakkari will be in action for her clash with Patricia Tig, a player who has beaten her once before in their only previous outing. That was a match played on the clay surface of the Madrid Open in 2016.
Sakkari, however, has grown as a player since then and reached her career-best of 27th in the world at the moment. This year has been one of her better ones with a win-loss record of 35-21 overall, and that includes her first WTA title. She won that in Rabat on clay.
At the US Open, Sakkari made the third round before Ash Barty got the better of her, in what was a repeat of the showing at Cincinnati. There, Barty had beaten Sakkari in the quarter-finals.
But the opponent here isn’t Barty; it’s Tig who is ranked 124th in the world. Tig began the year ranked 264th in the world, and did well at the ITF level before moving a notch higher and proved her mettle by reaching the final at Bucharest. She did that as a qualifier too.
Following that, there was a second round appearance at the WTA Japan Open last week and continuing with that form she won her qualifiers to make the main draw here. Sakkari will be a tough opponent but Tig could take a set off her.
Tip: Tig to win a set: 4/5 (Unibet)
Karolina Muchova v Alison van Uytvanck Preview
This will be the first meeting between the 45-ranked Karolina Muchova and the 62nd-ranked Alison van Uyyvanck. After a solid season under her belt, Muchova is hovering her personal best ranking and will be featuring in her first tournament since her third round loss at the hands of Serena Williams.
Earlier, she had also made the quarter-final at the New York Open and the last-eight at Wimbledon too.
Van Uyyvanck’s form hasn’t been much to write about but she did show signs of some spark with her quarter-final appearance last week in the WTA Japan Open. A final at Karlsruhe on clay helped too but where she will really want to take motivation from is her title win at the Budapest Open.
Tip: Three sets in the match: 17/10 (888Sport)
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Ajla Tomljanovic v Stefanie Voegele Preview
The 42nd-ranked Ajla Tomljanovic will be up against Switzerland’s Stefanie Voegele in their opening round match and this will be their fifth meeting. Before this, the head to head is 3-1 in favour of Tomljanovic and 3-0 in their last three meetings.
The last time they faced off was earlier this year at the Hua Hin Open on the same, hard court surface and in the first round as well. And it went in straight sets to the Aussie.
Tomljanovic was a quarter-finalist at the Zhenzhou Open last week where she lost to the eventual champion Karolina Pliskova, after having been dumped in the second round at the US Open. Voegele, a former 42nd-ranked player, has a 7-11 win-loss record on hard courts this season including a first round loss at Nanchang Open and a qualifying loss at the US Open.
Should be a straightforward win for Tomljanovic.
Tip: Tomljanovic to win in straight sets: 13/20 (Unibet)
Jelena Ostapenko v Timea Babos Preview
The former French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko has fallen off on the WTA rankings but will still go into this match with an edge on the head to head. In three previous matches, she has a 2-1 win-loss record against Timea Babos, including a straight-set win at Miami last year.
And while Babos is ranked 18 places behind Ostapenko she does enter this match with a better record on hard court surfaces than her Latvian opponent.
Ostapenko made the third round at the US Open though before she was sent packing by Aryna Sabalenka last week at Zhengzhou. On the other hand, Babos qualified for the US Open and aided by an injury issue for her opponent, entered round two there. She failed to qualify for the Seoul Open last week, which is why it’s bit of a surprise she starts narrow favourite here.
Tip: Ostapenko to win: 1/1 (888Sport)