2015 champion Simona Halep notched a solid victory to move past Donna Vekic in her Indian Wells opener and return to the third round at the BNP Paribas Open. In her first match since her injury layoff, Halep sealed the match 6-4, 6-1 after an hour and 10 minutes to set up a third-round encounter with Kristina Mladenovic, wtatennis.com reports.
“I think it was a very good match today,” Halep admitted in her post-match press conference. “I didn’t expect that, to be honest, because it’s tough to come back after four, five weeks without playing at all. “I tried just to stay positive, not expecting anything. Just going there and try to feel the game. So I did it pretty well, and I’m really proud of myself.”
Vekic, a 20-year-old Croatian wildcard, gave Halep a stern test during the tightly-contested opening set. After trading breaks six times, Halep finally gained a foothold and wrestled away the set. It was much more straightforward in the second, with Halep breaking three times to match into the third round.
On Friday Romanian tennis player Irina Begu qualified for the third round, after defeating US Louisa Chirico 6-1, 7-5. Begu (aged 26, WTA’s 32nd), the 29th seed, defeated Chirico (aged 20, WTA’s 65th) in one hour and 50 minutes. In the next round Begu will face Karolina Pliskova, 3rd WTA.
Begu secured a USD 41,350 cheque and 65 WTA points.
Monica Niculescu didn’t qualify for the third round, being defeated by Swiss player Timea Bacsinszky 7-5, 6-2.
In the doubles event, the pair Horia Tecau/Jean Julien Rojer qualified for the last sixteen round after defeating on Saturday Marin Cilic/Nikola Mektic 6-2, 4-6, 10-6. Also on Saturday, the pair Florin Mergea/ Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi (Romania/Pakistan) defeated Ivan Dodig (Croatia)/Marcel Granollers (Spain) 2-6, 6-3, 10-4 to reach the same round.