Dubai Tennis Championships: Swiatek, Sabalenka lead Dubai draw

DUBAI: World No.1 Iga Swiatek and Australian Open champion Aryna Sabalenka top the draw at the Dubai Tennis Championships, the first WTA 1000 event of the 2023 season. The tournament begins on Sunday.

Swiatek is in first place in the top quadrant of the draw and, like the top 8 seeds, has a bye in the first round. In the second round, she’ll compete against Leylah Fernandez or a qualifier. Swiatek’s quarter is being anchored by No. 6 seed Maria Sakkari, who is the next highest seed. Following consecutive semifinal appearances in Linz and Doha, Sakkari will play either Marketa Vondrousova or Karolina Pliskova in the second round.

The top two seeds in the second half of the draw are No. 4 seed Caroline Garcia and No. 5 seed Coco Gauff. This section also contains semifinals Victoria Azarenka and Australian Open champion Elena Rybakina. The No. 9 seed Rybakina will square off against Bianca Andreescu in the tournament’s blockbuster first round, while Azarenka will play Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.

No. 3 seed Jessica Pegula and No. 8 seed Belinda Bencic serve as the cornerstones of the third quarter. Both women are in dangerous shape going into Dubai, with Bencic riding a six-match winning streak after winning her second championship of the year in Abu Dhabi. Pegula, who previously won the doubles championship with Coco Gauff, is already in the Doha final where she will play Swiatek.

Sabalenka, the No. 2 seed, is leading the final bracket after winning her first major championship at the Australian Open in January. Either Jill Teichmann or the Linz champion Anastasia Potapova will be her first opponent. Sabalenka’s quarter also features seeds No. 7 Daria Kasatkina, No. 12 Petra Kvitova, and No. 13 Jelena Ostapenko.

The No. 1 and No. 2 seeds in the doubles draw are the two couples that competed in the Qatar TotalEnergies Open final, Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula, the Doha champions, and Lyudmyla Kichenok and Jelena Ostapenko.

Indian tennis pioneer Sania Mirza is scheduled to compete in her final competition during the doubles draw, which promises to be a touching occasion. In the opening round, Mirza and Madison Keys will take against Veronika Kudermetova and Liudmila Samsonova.