Can Paula Badosa be one of the dark horses at the 2023 WTA Italian Open in Rome? The Spaniard started her clay season extremely well with at least two wins in every event (Charleston, Stuttgart, and Madrid). Can she keep it going? To kick things off, she faces Anna-Lena Friedsam. We share our thoughts on that match and all the other action around the grounds. We split the day’s 20 matches between five articles–that means four articles after this one. The other articles feature Elina Svitolina vs Lesia Tsurenko, Lauren Davis vs Elisabetta Cocciaretto, Sloane Stephens vs Nadia Podoroska, and Sara Errani vs Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. Who do you think will win?
WTA Rome Day 2 Predictions
Lucia Bronzetti vs Danka Kovinic
Head-to-head: First meeting
Lucia Bronzetti has undeniably demonstrated her ability to peak for an event here or there, but these occurences are usually quite rare. Danka Kovinic has just been in much better form, winning an extremely stacked 100K ITF in Oeiras a couple of weeks back. The Montenegro-native should really take advantage of her opening here, provided Bronzetti doesn’t find another fairly random peak out of nowhere.
Prediction: Kovinic in 2
Varvara Gracheva vs Camila Osorio
Head-to-head: First meeting
This one looks very even. Varvara Gracheva was fully on track for a breakthrough campaign earlier in 2023, but she has slowed down a bit since the beginning of the clay season. She has the higher upside of the two, but someone so well-versed in clay-court tennis as Camila Osorio could easily take her down. The Colombian also looked really fine in the qualifying here. It’s more on Gracheva’s racket, but it’s not clear at all if she’ll manage to utilize that.
Prediction: Gracheva in 3
Dayana Yastremska vs Anna Kalinskaya
Head-to-head: 2-2
Dayana Yastremska leads the clay head-to-head with Anna Kalinskaya 2-1, but all of these matches happened a long while ago. The Russian generally would probably handle these conditions in Rome a tiny bit better, but it has to be said that her opponent grabbed some very nice rhythm in Reus last week and continued that in the qualifying here. This makes Kalinskaya’s edge much smaller.
Prediction: Kalinskaya in 3
Paula Badosa vs Anna-Lena Friedsam
Head-to-head: First meeting
The injury that forced her out of the Australian Open and a few tough draws after that left the impresssion that Paula Badosa is not in form this year. But that’s not really the case and the Spaniard has been proving it constantly since the clay season began. With all due respect to Anna-Lena Friedsam, if Badosa maintains her disposition, the German won’t be equipped to handle her.
Prediction: Badosa in 2
Main Photo Credit: Susan Mullane-USA TODAY Sports
