Mayar Sherif
Egypt’s Mayar Sherif will take on Anna Blinkova in the opening round of the Italian Open
Mayar Sherif is coming into this tournament following a quarter-final exit at the Madrid Open. She gave a very good account of herself in her previous tournament and will be looking to carry forward the positive momentum to Italy. At the Madrid Open, she received a walkover mid-way through her first encounter against Camila Giorgi and she made it count.
In the second round, Sherif registered a comprehensive 6-2, 7-6 victory against the No 30 seed Anhelina Kalinina. She didn’t just stop there and followed it up with another major upset against 5th seed Caroline Garcia.
She then got the better of 24th-seeded Elise Mertens before eventually losing to second-seed Aryna Sabalenka in the quarter-final stage. Sherif will be confident of doing well in Italy and it remains to be seen how far she can progress.
Blinkova is currently ranked World No.63 in WTA singles and hasn’t made a mark at the senior level yet. She is coming to this tournament at the back of a second-round exit from the WTA 125K Catalonia tournament. She has been pretty inconsistent on the tour and there are no noteworthy performances from her so far this season. Blinkova is the clear underdog in this match and she will face an uphill task against Sherif.
Date – Tuesday, 9th May
Court Type – Clay outdoor surface
Telecast – Tennis Channel
Start Time – To be Announced
Venue – Foro Italico
Match details – First Round match
Sherif and Blinkova have played each other only once before on the WTA tour. The Egyptian emerged victorious on that occasion at Marbella in 2023 and leads the overall head to head 1-0. However, Blinkova won’t be a pushover for sure. It is definitely a tough ask for the Russian though and Sherif enters this tie as the outright favourite both in terms of form and rankings. We are predicting a win in straight sets for Mayar Sherif.
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