Defending Strasbourg champion Elina Svitolina has made a winning start to her title defense at a French WTA 500 tournament after defeating a local player.
Svitolina, seeded at No. 7, overcame France’s Diane Parry 6-3 6-4 for her ninth consecutive win in Strasbourg.
After winning Strasbourg in 2020, Svitolina returned to the tournament last year and won her second title at the French clay tournament. This year, Svitolina is again off to a winning start in Strasbourg as the former world No. 3 hopes to win her third title at the tournament before the French Open.
In the Strasbourg round-of-16, Svitolina will again be playing against a French player as next up for the Ukrainian will be world No. 43 Clara Burel. Against Burel, Svitolina owns a 2-0 head-to-head record.
How Svitolina overcame Parry in her Strasbourg opener?
Svitolina made a great start to her Strasbourg opener, claiming an early break in the third game. Two games later, Svitolina had a chance to go up by a double break but Parry saved a break point to keep it a one-break distance.
Svitolina may have failed to go up by a double break in the fifth game but she managed to do so in the seventh game after earning her second break for a 5-2 lead.
Down by a double break, Parry managed to get one break back in the following game but Svitolina remained calm and still routinely closed out the set after breaking the Frenchwoman for the third time in the ninth game.
When the second set started, both Svitolina and Parry had break points but neither realized – the Ukrainian saved a break point in the third game before missing out on a break point in the fourth game.
After a couple of missed break points early on, the first break of the second set came in the sixth game when Svitolina broke Parry for a 4-2 lead. That’s when play was stopped due to darkness.
When the match resumed today, Svitolina routinely served out the seventh game for a 5-2 lead and then missed out on a match point on Parry’s serve in the eighth game before also stunningly getting broken to love when serving for the match in the ninth game.
However, Svitolina was able to quickly mentally recover as the Ukrainian broke Parry in the 10th game – the game in which the Frenchwoman was serving to stay in the match.
Svitolina struggled a bit to close out the match but in the end it all finished well for the defending Strasbourg champion.
