The 2019 WTA Tour continues in Stuttgart, Germany on Friday 26 April 2019 with the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix. Check out our full betting preview below for our selected quarter-final fixtures.
2019 WTA Tour | WTA Premier
Porsche Tennis Grand Prix
Porsche Arena, Stuttgart, Germany
Selected Quarter-Finals | 26 April 2019
Kiki Bertens (7/10)
vs Angelique Kerber (21/20)
Dutchwoman Kiki Bertens has incrementally emerged as one of the most complete players on the tour over the last few years. She is a consummate baseliner with a preference for clay though she has performed well on all surfaces of late: she reached the quarter-finals at Wimbledon last year. Bertens was a 2006 French Open semi-finalist and truly comes into her own on this surface. She has seven WTA titles, five of which came on clay – her last two came on the hard-courts of Cincinnati and St Petersburg. She reached the Madrid final last year in grand style, accounting for the likes of Wozniacki, Garcia and Sharapova en route. She is yet to replicate her sizzling 2018 heroics this season – outside of the title in St Petersburg that is. Her victory over resurgent Belinda Bencic in the last round indicates to me that Bertens in entering her comfortable portion of the campaign.
Two-time Stuttgart Champion and the overwhelming home crowd favourite, Angelique Kerber benefitted from cancellation in her opening match before pummelling Petkovic in the last round. The current Wimbledon Champion seemed to down tools somewhat following that sensational win at SW19. But she has come out swinging in 2019. A round of 16 outing at Melbourne was followed by a semi-final run in Qatar. She then enjoyed a terrific run to the Indian Wells final prior to a semi-final in Monterrey. She was plagued by a litany of quarterfinal finishes last season and will clearly be enthused by a greater cutting edge in these regular tour events. Clay is not traditionally her best surface and she still needs the Roland Garros title to complete the career Grand Slam.
These two players are certainly no strangers to one another having met six times before. They share the spoils 3-3, with Kiki Bertens winning the last time they met at last season’s WTA Championships. But Kerber had the edge when they last met on clay, disposing of Bertens at Roland Garros last season. I think that Bertens will be highly motivated to jump-start her season with a strong showing here this week.
Victoria Azarenka (7/10)
vs Anett Kontaveit (1/1)
Belarusian Victoria Azarenka has never been a stranger to controversy and her recent comments about gender pay divide have created some minor shockwaves through the tennis world. But the two-time Grand Slam Champion has also let her tennis do the talking for the first time in ages recently. She reached the final in Monterrey before injury curtailed her decidedly one-sided final against Garbine Muguruza. This week has gone swimmingly for Azarenka, despite arriving under the influence of heavy jet-lag. She beat Vera Zvonareva before meeting defending champion Karoline Pliskova in the round of 16. She lost the 1st set but drew on all her bog match experience to pull off her best victory of the season. To take down the defending manner in a come-from-behind manner will surely give her the confidence necessary to get back to winning ways.
Single-handedly putting Estonia back on the tennis map, Anett Kontaveit enjoyed a solid 2018 season that saw her rocket up the world rankings. She perhaps enjoyed her most consistent success on the clay, with semi-finals in this event last year and the more prestigious Rome tournament. A final in Wuhan late in the year really underlined a successful campaign for Kontaveit. Kontaveit enjoyed an extremely slow start to the year, which perhaps triggered some to doubt her staying power. But an excellent semi-final run in Miami could be the catalyst for a Kontaveit clay-court revival. She is a pugnacious competitor who has yet to drop a set this week, resoundingly beating Caroline Garcia in the process.
It’s perhaps unsurprising to discover that this will be the first meeting between these two. Azarenka may be feeling a little jaded following that epic match against Karoline Pliskova. But I think this could be her ‘Tiger’ moment and a straight sets victory at 43/20 looks appealing.
Written by Damien Kayat for Hollywoodbets.
