All eight second-round matches will be played on Wednesday at the 2024 WTA Adelaide International. Jessica Pegula will be looking for a rebound after a disappointing exit for Team United States at the United Cup. Her first match of the event is an all-American clash with Bernarda Pera, whom she defeated at the Australian Open last year. We also look at the rest of the day’s matches in a separate article. Who do you think will come out on top?
WTA Adelaide Day 3 Prediction
Caroline Garcia vs Jelena Ostapenko
Head-to-head: Ostapenko 1-0
Now that will be a big-hitting matchup. Both players are incredibly aggressive on return and while a bit differently oriented, their play styles are essentially all about the same thing, completely taking the racket out of the opponent’s hands. Who gets the edge? Caroline Garcia has played five matches in 2024 so far and all of these went to a third set. She’s even struggled to beat a couple of opponents ranked outside the top 200. Jelena Ostapenko has looked cleaner and has better stats on return with the Frenchwoman breaking serve the last out of all top 50 players last year.
Prediction: Ostapenko in 3
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova vs Katerina Siniakova
Head-to-head: Pavlyuchenkova 3-2
Both players had to qualify here despite being ranked in the top 60 and it really helped them get back in rhythm after losses in the first week of the season. It’s a matchup we’ve been revisiting from time to time over the years and in fact the most recent iteration of it came just three months ago in the Hong Kong quarterfinals. Katerina Siniakova won that one and while she doesn’t quite have the peak level of Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, she gets a slight nod here with more impressive wins in Adelaide so far.
Prediction: Siniakova in 3
Ekaterina Alexandrova vs Veronika Kudermetova
Head-to-head: 2-2
These two were supposed to play each other at this exact stage of the event in Adelaide last year, but Ekaterina Alexandrova ended up withdrawing. As fate would have it, now they’ve run into each other again. Veronika Kudermetova owns the only hard-court win in the head-to-head, but that came over four years ago. Nonetheless, Alexandrova has been a little unimpressive for a while now and is the less reliable player of the two with a big A-game/B-game disparity.
Prediction: Kudermetova in 3
Bernarda Pera vs Jessica Pegula
Head-to-head: Pegula 1-0
Team United States went out earlier than expected at the United Cup and part of that was Jessica Pegula unexpectedly losing to Katie Boulter from a set and a break up. She did get a win later on though and it would be reasonable to expect her to keep improving with every performance. Especially on a fairly quick hard court it’s tough to see Bernarda Pera being all that much of a threat and the lefty’s heavy topspin forehand won’t be doing as much damage here.
Prediction: Pegula in 2
Main Photo Credit: Jerry Lai-USA TODAY Sports
