The Zhengzhou Open is the final WTA 500 of the season and features the cream of the crop in the 28-player field.
Main draw action will commence on Monday, October 9th, and the draw for the 2023 edition has been released throwing up the potential for exciting matches. Three Grand Slam champions and two Grand Slam finalists garnish the field.
Top seed Coco Gauff raised eyebrows with her surprise decision to take a late wild card into this year's field. The tournament organizers will be sweating at Gauff's arrival after the young American appeared to struggle with a shoulder issue during her Beijing defeat against Iga Swiatek.
The top four seeds at the tournament have a bye in the first round. So the 2023 US Open champion will begin her campaign on Wednesday against one of Petra Martic or Magda Linette. Gauff needed three hours to deconstruct the Croatian in Beijing this week, so she'll be hopeful of avoiding that matchup.
In the bottom half of the draw, we could see a rematch from Beijing between Elena Rybakina and Liudmila Samsonova. But the Russian doesn't have the luxury of a free pass that second seed Rybakina enjoys. So Samsonova will need to take down Jasmine Paolini to set up a rematch against the Kazakh.
Tunisia's Ons Jabeur has the peace of mind from qualifying for the WTA Finals. She didn't play her best tennis at the China Open, possibly due to the tension of qualifying for the season finale, and she was coming off a taxing week in Ningbo.
Jabeur will open up against the winner of the match between Lucia Bronzetti and Hanyu Guo. Third seed Maria Sakkari missed out on the Cancun field, but the Greek is looking to close out the season strongly. She will await the victor of the match between China's No. 1 QInwen Zheng and Donna Vekic.
A Top 20 showdown pitting Veronika Kudermetova and sixth seed Caroline Garcia in the first round is must see. And former French Open champion Barbora Krejcikova will square off against wily German veteran Tatjana Maria.
The quarterfinal projections are very interesting. In the top half, Gauff could play Garcia, while Jabeur is slated to meet eighth seed Daria Kasatkina. In the bottom half, Karolina Muchova could lock horns with Sakkari while a Grand Slam champion meeting between Krejcikova and Rybakina could be on the cards.
2023 Zhengzhou Open WTA Draw:
| 1. Coco Gauff (1) |
| 2. BYE |
| 3. Petra Martic |
| 4. Magda Linette |
| 5. Qualifier |
| 6. Qualifier |
| 7. Veronika Kudermetova |
| 8. Caroline Garcia (6) |
| 9. Ons Jabeur (4) |
| 10. BYE |
| 11. Lucia Bronzetti |
| 12. Hanyu Guo |
| 13. Qualifier |
| 14. Zhouxuan Bai |
| 15. Elisabetta Cocciaretto |
| 16. Daria Kasatkina (8) |
| 17. Karolina Muchova (5) |
| 18. Qualifier |
| 19. Anhelina Kalinina |
| 20. Qualifier |
| 21. Donna Vekic |
| 22. Qinwen Zheng |
| 23. BYE |
| 24. Maria Sakkari (3) |
| 25. Barbora Krejcikova (7) |
| 26. Tatjana Maria |
| 27. Lin Zhu |
| 28. Qualifier |
| 29. Liudmila Samsonova |
| 30. Jasmine Paolini |
| 31. BYE |
| 32. Elena Rybakina (2) |
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