WTA Linz Open: Flavia Pennetta vs. Elena Vesnina

Flavia Pennetta and Elena Vesnina will face off on Wednesday in the first round of the Generali Ladies Linz Open.

After a fantastic run of results in Beijing, Flavia Pennetta will enter this week’s Generali Ladies Linz Open as an outsider for the title. The Italian produced victories over Caroline Wozniacki, Shuai Peng, Daniela Hantuchova and Dominika Cibulkova last week, and could only be stopped by an in form Agnieszka Radwanska, who eventually won the title.

Pennetta’s first round opponent will be world No. 66 Elena Vesnina. Vesnina hasn’t been in action since the U.S Open, and she’ll be aiming to turn around a dire run of form. She’s only won one matchup since July. Unless she’s able to turn a corner here, she’ll get dumped out of this competition on Wednesday.

Pennetta and Vesnina have been locked in some exciting displays of tennis over the past six years, and they have a 2-2 head to head record against each other. Vesnina won the most recent of these contests in three sets (Moscow, 2010). Despite this, recent form suggests that Pennetta enters this tie as the favourite.