PALERMO. Konta out after Halep. Vekic and Yastremska among the players to follow

The WTA tour is about to come back this week with the international event in Palermo. The organization secured a rather strong line-up with the likes of Simona Halep and Jo Konta, but eventually both of them decided not to play. Simona wasn’t comfortable with the spiking of the Coronavirus cases in Romania. Konta decided to focus to play on hard courts so as to go and compete in Lexington before the Western and Southern Open and the US Open.

The Palermo line-up

The line-up of this WTA event in Palermo is still pretty strong with the presence of the likes of Donna Vekic and Dayana Yastremska, Marketa Vondrousova, Maria Sakkari, and Jelena Ostapenko just to name a few. The defending champion is Jil Teichmann that last year defeated Kiki Bertens in the final 7-6 (3) 6-2.

Here the revised line-up

1. P. Martic
2. M. Vondrousova
3. M. Sakkari
4. A. Kontaveit
5. E. Mertens
6. D. Vekic
7. D. Yastremska
8. K. Muchova
9. E. Alexandrova
10. J. Ostapenko
11. K. Mladenovic
12. R. Peterson
13. P. Hercog
14. I. Swiatek
15. F. Ferro
16. A. Van Uytyvanck
17. A. Blinkova
18. L. Siegemund
19. D. Kasatkina
20. Kr. Pliskova
21. A. Rus
22. T. Zidansek
23. S. Cirstea
24. K. Flipkens

Johanna Konta in 2020

Ranked world no.14, Konta played her last match on the 7^th of March when she capitulated to Marie Bouzkova 6-3 6-4 in the semifinal in Monterrey.

Johanna Konta’s most significant result of this season was reaching the semi-finals in Monterrey.

Simona Halep in 2020

Now the world no.2, Simona played her last match on the 22^nd of February when she overcame Elena Rybakina 3-6 6-3 7-6⁵ in the final in Dubai to win her 20^th career title.

This year the Romanian has a 10-2 win-loss record. The Romanian clinched 1 title in Dubai.

Johanna Konta and Simona Halep played each other 7 times. The head to head is 4-3 for Halep. The last time that they fought against each other, Simona Halep won 7-5 6-1 in the 2^nd round in Madrid (Mutua Madrid Open) in May 2019.

Donna Vekic in 2020

Now ranked no.24, Donna played her last match on the 24^th of February when she surrendered to Iga Swiatek 6-4 7-5 in the 1^st round in Doha.

Dayana Yastremska in 2020

Now ranked no.25, the Ukrainian played her last match on the 26^th of February when she was defeated by Garbine Muguruza 6-2 6-4 in the 3^rd round in Doha.

Dayana Yastremska’s most significant result of the present season was reaching the final in Adelaide.

Donna Vekic and Dayana Yastremska played each other twice. The head to head is 2-0 for Yastremska. The last time that they squared off, Dayana Yastremska won 6-4 6-3 in the quarter in Adelaide (Adelaide International) on the 16^th of January 2020.

In the following video you can watch the highlights.