2017 Citi Open, Washington DC, USA, WTA International

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DATE: July 31 - August 6, 2017
SURFACE: Hard
PRIZE MONEY: $226,750
FIELD SIZE: 32
DEFENDING CHAMPION: Yanina Wickmayer

Seeds:

1 HALEP, Simona
2 MLADENOVIC, Kristina
3 DAVIS, Lauren
4 GOERGES, Julia
5 DODIN, Oceane
6 NICULESCU, Monica
7 MAKAROVA, Ekaterina
8 MCHALE, Christina

The Tournament:

The Washington Open (currently sponsored by Citi bank) is a joint professional tennis tournament played on outdoor hard courts, and held annually at the William H.G. FitzGerald Tennis Center in Rock Creek Park, Washington, D.C., United States. The tournament hosts both the womens and mens tennis tours.

About Washington DC

Washington, DC, the U.S. capital, is a compact city on the Potomac River, bordering the states of Maryland and Virginia. It's defined by imposing neoclassical monuments and buildings including the iconic ones that house the federal government's 3 branches: the Capitol, White House and Supreme Court, but also its museums and performing-arts venues such as the Kennedy Center.

Wendy Harman / Wikimedia

Matt H. Wade / Wikimedia

Ishaan Dalal / Wikimedia

Tourism Guide:

 

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The Draw:

 

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Halep gets a pretty draw for a #1 seed. Taking on Sloane Stephens who won this title in 2015.

 

[Correspondent Kiu]

I'll have a report for you reader, a live one as I am planning to attend a couple of days.
Still haven't decided on which days, keep checking this thread for updates.

 

[Correspondent Kiu]

Long rain delay in Washington, play just resumed.
Before all of that, I got to see a bit of Simona, more of Heather and also a little Makarova.
Watson didn't make it, more on that later.
I'm going back, want to see some Kiki
There will be late play tonight.

 

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Results from the Washington Open Women's Singles Round 1 matches on Tuesday

Patricia Tig (Romania) beat Heather Watson (Britain) 7-6(4) 7-6(3)
7-Ekaterina Makarova (Russia) beat Jamie Loeb (U.S.) 7-6(4) 6-3
Monica Puig (Puerto Rico) beat Louisa Chirico (U.S.) 6-4 6-4
1-Simona Halep (Romania) beat Sloane Stephens (U.S.) 7-6(3) 6-0


Sloane gets bagelled in the second but good to see her coming back.

 

[Correspondent Kiu]

A little report:
I saw the end of Simona/Sloane, those two last games were competitive but Simona won them, Sloane had her chances, Simona shut the door quickly, couple of pictures for you:

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I also got to watch the end of Makarova match(she won) and quite a few games of Tig/Watson match, again I saw Watson having chances and even the crowd support, but failed to capitalize at the end, she broke late to push the match to a second set tie-breaker while she was at it.
A couple of pictures of that:

Because of the 5 hour rain delay, I could not get to watch Kiki, it was past midnight when I left. Her match got postponed to early today.

Session 5 is about to start, loaded order of play, I'll be following on the screen.

 

[kskate2]

Sloane is out of shape. She's looking a little heavy and needs to get that back. During the short time when she was good, her movement was stellar.

 

[Correspondent Kiu]

Order of play is out, it gets better.

 

[Moxie]

Looks like Mladenovic lost fairly meekly.

 

[kskate2]

Simona had to retire in the 3rd set for heat exhaustion. Maka into SF

 

[Moxie]

I just read this about the player who upset Mladenovic: 17-yr. old Canadian, Bianca Andreescu "became the first WTA player born in the 21st C. to beat a top 20 rival." (via NYT)

 

[britbox]

Results from the Washington Open Women's Singles Quarterfinal matches on Friday

4-Julia Goerges (Germany) beat 6-Monica Niculescu (Romania) 6-3 6-4
7-Ekaterina Makarova (Russia) beat 1-Simona Halep (Romania) 2-6 6-3 1-0 (Halep retired)
5-Oceane Dodin (France) beat Sabine Lisicki (Germany) 5-7 6-4 7-6(4)

Dodin squares off against Makarova and Goerges will play the winner of Petkovic/Andreescu

Nice pics @kiu Are you getting to any of the semis/final?

 

[Correspondent Kiu]

Sorry, I was out yesterday.

Order of play:

 

[Moxie]

I'm rooting for Petkovic to get herself back on track with this win. She just saved 3 BPs, serving for the set.

 

[Moxie]

Great match and good win for Goerges. I'll root for the German double (women's and men's.)

 

[Moxie]

I don't know what happened to Goerges in the 3rd set, but congratulations to Makarova.

 

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