Tennis: Five Romanian players to participate in Phillip Island Trophy (WTA)

Five Romanian players, Patricia Tig, Irina Begu, Ana Bogdan, Mihaela Buzarnescu and Monica Niculescu, will participate in the Phillip Island Trophy (WTA 250) tournament, with total prizes of 235,238 US dollars, which will debut in Melbourne on Saturday. Buzarnescu and Niculescu will play in the qualifiers, while Tig, Begu and Bogdan entered directly on the main board. Buzarnescu (32, WTA's 138) will meet French Chloe Paquet (26, WTA's 187), while Niculescu (33, WTA's 146) will face British Francesca Jones (20, WTA's 245). Jones, who, due to an embryonic development abnormality, has three toes on her right foot, four on her left and four fingers on each hand, defeated Niculescu in the first round of qualifiers at the Australian Open last month in Dubai, with 6-3, 6-2. Patricia Tig (26, WTA'56) will play in the first round at the Phillip Island Trophy against an opponent to come from the qualifications round. Irina Begu (30, WTA's 74) will first face Nadia Podoroska (24, WTA's 45), seed number 12. The Argentinean won their first duel, last year, in the first round of the Linz tournament, 6- 4, 6-4. Ana Bogdan (28, WTA's 96) will also have a famous opponent, Latvian Anastasija Sevastova (30, WTA's 53), seed number 14. Each of them managed to win a direct match in Bucharest. Bogdan won in 2017, in the quarterfinals, 6-1, 6-3, and Sevastova won in 2019, in the first round, 5-7, 7-6 (4), 7-5. AGERPRES (RO-author: Mihai Tenea, editor: Teodor Ciobanu, EN - author: Cristina Zaharia, editor: Adina Panaitescu)