Anett Kontaveit's recent form shows no signs of stopping after she won 2 consecutive sets against Barbora Krejcikova in the opening match of the 2021 WTA Finals.
Kontaveit, the first Estonian player in history to participate in the tournament at the end of the season, defeated the Czech Republic 6-3, 6-4.
This is her 11th consecutive win after winning the Kremlin Cup and Transylvania Open. Krejcikova's winning record for consecutive matches in the WTA system in 2021 is currently 15 matches that she reached earlier this year.
Playing at an altitude of 5,500 meters above sea level, Kontaveit and Krejcikova had to face each other at fast ball speed. However, the 25-year-old girl has proven to be more stable, and sometimes benefited from valuable mistakes from the other side of the net.
The clearest example in the first set was when Krejcikova made 3 consecutive mistakes to help the Estonian tennis player take a 3-1 lead before ending set 1 after only 31 minutes. That scenario was repeated in set 2, when Kontaveit won the only break and maintained points in the cross-field games.
Kontaveit has won 37 hard-fought matches this season, more than any other player on the WTA Tour. Despite a victory in their debut WTA Finals, Kontaveit still has a lot of work to do if they want to qualify for the group stage. At the weekend, she will play against Garbine Muguruza and Karolina Pliskova, two players who have experience at the event.
In the following match, Pliskova had a rather tough match against Muguruza. Seed No. 3 beat Spanish seed No. 6 with a score of 4-6, 6-2, 7-6 (6) to temporarily lead the Teotihuacan group with Kontaveit.
This is the 11th confrontation between the two former world No. 1s and the first time since the 2019 Australian Open. Pliskova has been better, winning eight of their previous 10 meetings, two of which were at the WTA Finals in 2016 and 2017.
Pliskova opened better with an early break to lead 2-0, but an uncertain serve game including two double errors created conditions for Muguruza to gain control in the first set. Pliskova could not find her pace again, stuck to 18 and only had 5 winning points.
Pliskova took a 2-0 lead in set 2 again, but this time, the Czech Republic player was excellent in the delivery situations. She scored in 89% of her first passes. If in set 1, Pliskova only scored 33% in the second set, then in set 2, the scoring rate was up to 62%. Thanks to that, confidence returned to easily win this set.
But it is not easy to overthrow the Muguruza. In set 3, with 2 players competing in each match, Pliskova had 2 chances to win match-points when the score was 5-4, but then the resilience of Muguruza equalized the gap. Continuing to draw 6-6, the tie-break series was tense and only stopped at 8-6 for the No. 3 seed.
