Australian wildcard Daria Saville Is In A Great Speed into the second round in the Miami Open women’s singles draw.
The 28 Years has improved her record to eight wins from her past 10 games, continuing her impressive run at the Miami Open.
Saville scored a 7-5 6-3 victory against world Number 81 Greet Minnen in first round action today.
She needed two hours and three minutes to wear down her Belgian opponent and book a second-round showdown with former world Number 1 Simona Halep.
This is only Saville’s third WTA-level event contested overseas this season – and her fourth in total since August 2019.
The former world No.20 has been sidelined with foot and Achilles injuries in recent years, but is making a promising return this season. Saville, nee Gavrilova, skyrocketed up the rankings to world No.249 after a career-best fourth-round run at Indian Wells last week.
Saville has beaten Halep once before, at Rome in 2016. However, the two-time Grand Slam champion leads their head-to-head record 3-1.
Saville is one of three Australian women competing in the singles main draw at Miami this week. Storm Sanders had also been hoping to qualify, but lost to world No.87 Wang Xinyu in the final qualifying round.
Thanasi Kokkinakis has successfully qualified for the men’s singles main draw, joining five compatriots in the field.
World No.97 Kokkinakis scored a 6-3 6-4 win against Italian veteran Andreas Seppi in final qualifying round action today.
Kokkinakis fired 10 aces and conceded only seven points on his service games in the 92-minute encounter.
The 25-year-old Australian has been pitted against former world No.7 Richard Gasquet, a 35-year-old Frenchman currently ranked No.81, in the opening stage.
