TEB BNP Paribas Tennis Championship Istanbul kicked off today ( April 19) at TTF Istanbul Tennis Center. The women’s tennis tournament will take place April 18-24, 2022.
The event features a 32-woman singles draw, as well as a 16-player doubles field.
The qualifying draw matches at TEB BNP Paribas Tennis Championship Istanbul have been completed on April 18. Due to heavy rain, the order of play had to be changed a few times. As a result, four main draw matches were postponed to April 19.
After beating 3rd seed Kamilla Rakhimova 6-3, 6-1, Austrian Julia Grabher became the first one to progress. Marina Melnikova overcame former no. 19 Donna Vekic 6-0, 7-6 and qualified for the main draw.
In the first round, only Turkish winner Berfu Cengiz was beaten by Romanian Ana Bogdan 7-5, 6-3 and failed to progress. Lesia Tsurenko, Anastasia Potapova and Qiang Wang also reached the main draw of the TEB BNP Paribas Tennis Championship Istanbul.
On a second consecutive rain-interrupted day on April 19, some of the planned matches were postponed to Wednesday.
Defending champion Sorana Cirstea was in action in the first match of the center court against lucky loser Kamilla Rakhimova. After a close first set, world no. 24 Cirstea managed to dominate the second and booked her place in the second round by 6-4, 6-1. 24 year-old Hungarian Anna Bondar faced 2020 semifinalist Tereza Martincova. Thanks to impressive service performance, Bondar won 6-4, 7-5, and reached the next round.
Nuria Parrizas Diaz and Martina Trevisan’s duel was one of the highlights of the day. Spaniard Diaz was victorious after 2 hours and 14 minutes by 7-6, 7-5, and set a second-round clash with Bondar.
İpek Öz and Pemra Özgen, wild card holders from hosts Turkey, also played their first-round matches. Turkish no. 1 İpek was beaten by Arantxa Rus 6-3, 6-1 while qualifier Julia Grabher defeated Pemra 7-5, 6-2. Rus will face last year’s winner Cirstea in the second round.
Jil Teichmann battled past Greet Minnen in the only three-setter of the day. After a 2 hours 27 minutes fight, Teichmann progressed to the second round and will face Grabher.
In the first doubles match of the day, Kaitlyn Christian/Lidziya Marozava beat Elixane Lechemia/Ingrid Neel 6-4, 6-3 to advance to the quarterfinals.
Photo credit: AA
