Tennis is about to meet its first champions of the 2021 season on both the men's and women's circuits, as many players are looking in Doha for one of the 16 places for the final draw of the Australian Open. We review how the situation is in the Abu Dhabi, Antalya and Delray Beach tournaments, which will crown the first champions in tennis in 2021 this coming Wednesday.
Australian Open preview
This Sunday the preliminary phase of the Australian Open began in Doha, which will decide the 16 male and female tennis players who will complete the final draw of the tournament, which will be played from February 8 to 21 in Melbourne. In this preliminary phase appear the names of prominent players such as Carlos Alcaraz, Denis Kudla, Damir Dzumhur, Evgeni Donskoy, Mario Vilella, Henri Laaksonen or Carlos Taberner in the men's category and Kaja Juvan, Greet Minnen, Georgina García Pérez, Sara Errani, Anna Kalinskaya, Timea Babos, Eugenie Bouchard, Catherine McNally, Margarita Gasparyan, Lesia Tsurenko or Tsvetana Pironkova.
WTA Abu Dhabi
In the first major women's title of the season, several of the great rackets of the WTA circuit will meet in the decisive games for the title from this Tuesday. Maria Sakkari, Muguruza's executioner in the round of 16 and who defeated the favorite Sofia Kenin in the quarterfinals, will face Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka in the semifinals. The other semifinal will start between the winners of the matches between Marta Kostyuk and Sara Sorribes and the confrontation between Veronika Kudermetova and Elina Svitolina. The winners of both crosses will meet this Wednesday in search of the first title of the year in the WTA.
Antalya Open
The Turkish tournament will crown the first champion of the season on the ATP circuit. This Tuesday the semifinals of the tournament will be played and in the first of them will face Alexander Bublick, who beat the great favorite Matteo Berrettini, and the French Jeremy Chardy. The other semi-final will be played by David Goffin and the winner of the quarter-final match between Nikoloz Basilashvili and Alex de Miñaur. The winners of both semifinals will meet in the grand final on Wednesday, January 13.
Delray beach
This Tuesday morning we will know who will be the four semifinalists of the tournament. Christian Harrison, who beat the favorite Cristian Garín, will face the Italian Gianluca Mager, while Hubert Hurkacz will meet the Ecuadorian Roberto Quiroz. Frances Tiafoe and Cameron Norrie will play the third quarter-final of the tournament, while Sebastian Korda and John Isner will seek the last place for a semifinals that will be played in the early hours of Tuesday to Wednesday before the grand final of the tournament (early Wednesday morning at Thursday).