WTA Prague: Simona Halep returns to the tour with a tremendous victory
Simona Halep returned to the WTA tour with a hard-fought victory in Prague. In addition to the top seeded Romanian, the two and three leading players also qualified for the second round.
by Nikolaus Fink
last edit: Aug 11, 2020, 04:35 pm
Last week, Halep canceled her start in Palermo at short notice, but a few days later the world number two in Prague should make her comeback on the WTA tour. The Romanian had significantly more trouble than expected in the 6: 1, 1: 6 and 7: 6 (3) success over Polona Hercog.
Halep got off to a dream start and quickly took the lead 6-1 and 1-0. Then the thread broke with the Wimbledon winner of the previous year, Hercog won six games in a row and thus also round number two. The third set then turned into a real roller coaster ride: Halep missed six match points before the all-important tie-break, but in the short decision she was able to assert herself 7: 3. The 28-year-old now meets Barbora Krejcikova.
Petra Martic and Elise Mertens are also in the second round. The Croatian number two of the tournament beat Varvara Gracheva 7: 6 (2) and 6: 3, while Mertens, who was third, needed three sets to win against Jasmine Paolini.
However, Ekaterina Alexandrova and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova were eliminated with numbers five and six of the sandpit event. The only German in the main field, Laura Siegemund, will meet Mayar Sherif from Egypt later on Tuesday. Tamara Korpatsch, however, missed the jump into the main competition.