After photographing the Qatar Total Open final, Jimmie48 has arrived at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, so we have extensive coverage of everything that happened on Monday, the second day of first-round action at the WTA 1000 tournament.
Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan, who had lost last year’s Dubai final to Simona Halep on a third-set tiebreak, kicked off this year’s edition of the event with a comfortable 6-0 6-4 win over Zheng Saisai. The 14th-seeded Kazakh lost just seven points as she built a 6-0 3-1 lead.
Madison Keys celebrated the International Women’s Day by wearing a Know Your Power tank. The American seed No.11 raced past Liang En-Shuo, the 2018 Australian Open girls’ champion competing in her third WTA main draw.
Rocking the purple Nike Spring Slam Melbourne Tank and Skirt, Russian wildcard Anastasia Potapova won 91% of points on her first serve to defeat Germany’s Laura Siegemund 6-3 6-2.
Seed No.15 Anett Kontaveit, last year’s Dubai quarterfinalist, spent less than an hour on the court to defeat Timea Babos 6-2 6-1.
Caroline Garcia reeled off five straight games from 1-4 down in the third set to upset Angelique Kerber 3-6 6-2 6-4. The first set of this battle of two former Top 5 players featured a total of just seven winners to 30 unforced errors.
The three-time Grand Slam champion Kerber had won the previous three meetings with Garcia in straight sets. They’ve played each other nine times and today’s victory is Garcia’s third over the German.
Fresh from runner-up finish at Doha, ninth seed Garbine Muguruza booked a second-round spot at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships with a 6-3 7-5 win over Irina-Camelia Begu.
The Spaniard’s next opponent will be American Amanda Anisimova, who has finally started her 2021 WTA season and it was a successful beginning, a 6-2 6-2 win over Ana Konjuh.
Shelby Rogers eliminated hard-hitting qualifier Kaia Kanepi 7-6(4) 6-2.
Playing her first match since lifting the Australian Open doubles title, tenth seed Elise Mertens saved 11 out of 17 break points to overcome lucky loser Viktoriya Tomova 4-6 6-2 6-4.
Meanwhile, Aryna Sabalenka was taking photos with the trophy she earned as a newly-crowned top-ranked doubles player.
Jimmie48 also attended Monday’s practice sessions of Aryna Sabalenka, Karolina Pliskova, Kiki Bertens and Elina Svitolina.
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Nice pictures of Aryna. I have never seen her dressed up before but suspected she would look interesting.
CLT, you haven’t? She’s shared on Instagram many photos of her modeling in various photoshoots.