Taiwan Open, Taipei City QF Prediction
?? (5) Yulia Putintseva vs ?? Kateryna Kozlova
Yulia Putintseva and Kateryna Kozlova will go head-to-head for the first time at the tour level when they meet for a spot in the semi-finals at the Taiwan Open on Friday. Putintseva is one of the highest seeds remaining in the draw and may perhaps believe that this is a chance for her to finally win a WTA tournament. However, Kozlova looms as a big challenge for the Kazakh, the indoor hard court surface probably favours Kozlova.
Yulia Putintseva is through to the quarter-final stage in Taipei City without dropping a set. However, Putintseva has struggled to close out both of her matches this week despite dominating for the majority of each match. Putintseva started the week with a 6-2 6-4 win over Junri Namigata before confirming her spot in the final 8 with a 6-3 7-6 win over Kai-Chen Chang. Putintseva squandered a 1-5 lead and multiple match points in the second round before rebounding from 5-6 to take the match in the second set tiebreak.
Kateryna Kozlova also confirmed her spot in the final 8 in Taiwan with a tough victory. Kozlova came from a set down to defeat Ying-Ying Duan 3-6 6-2 7-6. In the opening round Kozlova produced a stunning performance to eliminate the top seeded Shuai Zhang 6-2 6-4, one of the better performances of the tournament thus far.
It will be interesting to see how this match-up pans out between the pair of 23-year-old’s.
Leave a Reply