Johanna Konta in the third round of the Nature Valley International, Eastbourne 2019
Johanna Konta of Great Britain in action during the third-round at the 2019 Nature Valley International WTA Premier tennis tournament

Tennis | WTA Toronto 2019 | Konta faces Yastremska on her tour return, where slow and steady wins the race

By Ros Satar

  • Johanna Konta [13] v Dayana Yastremska | Konta leads H2H 1-0
TORONTO, CANADA – British No. 1 Johanna Konta returns to the tour after her run to the Wimbledon quarter-final, and faces Dayana Yastremska for the second time this year.

 

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Johanna Konta [13] v Dayana Yastremska | Konta leads H2H 1-0

It has been a long break after a busy clay and grass court swing for the British No. 1 Johanna Konta. Her run to the semi-final of Roland Garros having never won a first round match in Paris dovetailed into a busy grass court season with a run to the quarter-finals of Wimbledon, and sees the Brit back in the Top 20.

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As 13th seed she does not have the benefit of a bye in the first of the big lead-up events to the US Open, and is in early action, against Ukraine’s Dayana Yastremska. As a junior, she sprung to attention after reaching the final of the girls’ singles at Wimbledon and since then has impressed enough to have picked up three titles on the WTA Tour.

Neither player has played since Wimbledon so there is perhaps n advantage to be had there and the young Ukrainian is certainly fearless, clubbing the ball well off both wings with winners that can take people’s breath away. Where Konta has sometimes suffered with over-thinking a shot in key moments, Yastremska seems to batter away a little more intuitively.

However, this style of play does come with some pitfalls – she is just 19 and at times it shows in her shot selection and racks up double-faults, and as such is still very much growing into her game style. At the other end of the court, Konta is a lot more consistent overall, and the key to this match will be her more slow and steady approach,

Of course that is not to say that she will be a passive bystander in the proceedings. She handily dispatched Yastremska in Eastbourne, but of course on a surface that lends itself very well to her game. On the leveller of hard courts, Konta’s aggressive play will match Yastremska’s very clean and (sometimes) precision ball-striking, but this probably will not be as easy as their Eastbourne encounter.

Prediction: Konta in straight sets.

Konta & Yastremska are scheduled on Centre Court at 11am (4pm BST).

 

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