After crushing Taylor Townsend in the opening round, No. 2 seed Elise Mertens is now coming up against Tatjana Maria at the WTA 250 in Singapore. How will the Belgian handle her opponent’s tricky slice-and-dice game? Meanwhile, No. 4 seed Xinyu Wang faces a tough challenger in 18-year-old Maya Joint. Who do you think will prevail?<\/p>\n
Head-to-head:<\/strong> First meeting<\/p>\n Kimberly Birrell handed a surprisingly quick exit to the recent Brisbane runner-up Polina Kudermetova, while Hailey Baptiste recovered from a disastrous opening set to defeat Renata Zarazua. The American should have a stronger game indoors and when Birrell was trying to play in these conditions last year, her results were poor (1-5 at the ITF level). Baptiste isn’t as much of an attacker as Kudermetova and should have a better chance at not hitting herself off the court against a solid opponent. Head-to-head:<\/strong> First meeting<\/p>\n Maya Joint can already be proud of how she’s developing this season and things can only improve from here. The Australian survived an indoor specialist in Alycia Parks<\/a> in the opening round, but it won’t be as easy to draw out errors from Xinyu Wang here. The No. 4 seed has a much steadier attacking game and while she was involved in a tough opener against Rebecca Marino, that was just a high-quality encounter between two players who enjoyed the indoor conditions in Singapore. Wang is the favorite, but Joint can be very dangerous.
\nPrediction: Baptiste in 3<\/em><\/p>\nMaya Joint vs Xinyu Wang<\/h4>\n
\nPrediction: Wang in 3<\/em><\/p>\n