World No. 5 tennis player and No. 3 on this week’s board in Doha, Caroline Garcia, meets Maria Sakkari in the quarterfinals of the Qatar Open, the game starts on Thursday (16/02).

Hours after the 27-year-old Greek’s impressive win over Ekaterina Alexandrova (No. 18), the Frenchwoman came back from defeat and, with great surprise, eliminated Karolina Mukhova to begin her journey to the WTA 500 institution of the Middle East with one positive result.

After three hours of a very impressive duel, the 29-year-old prevailed against the former No. 19 and current No. 123 of the tennis player in the world rankings 6-7(3), 7-5, 6-4 and returned to the “8” Best of Doha after five years (Qatar Open 2018).

Sakkari and Garcia are a couple that has kept us busy on the Tour lately as they are two athletes who have been consistently at the highest level in recent years.

They played three games as opponents. Everyone, in very big tournaments. The quarter-finals they will play in Doha this year will be the… least important game they have ever played.

Because in 2017 they faced each other in the semifinals of the WTA 1000 event in Wuhan, China. Garcia had stopped Sakkari’s first, very important run on the Tour and won her in straight sets.

It was five years before they met again. Last year, in which both had excellent seasons, the Frenchwoman won two more games against Maria.

The first, at the “32” of Cincinnati (WTA 1000), after a tough fight that was decided in the deciding set. At the second, last major tournament of the year, Garcia and Sakkari met in the semifinals of the WTA Finals in Guadalajara.

There, the 29-year-old comfortably won in straight sets just hours before being crowned champion in Mexico.

Overall, Garcia leads 3-0 in H2H, with Sakkari playing excellent tennis this week in Qatar and looking fit to celebrate her first win against the in-form Frenchwoman in recent months.

SOURCE: TENNIS24