Simona Halep wants to start at the Premier Tournament in Moscow this week. A good two weeks after her diagnosis of a herniated disc, her performance in the Russian capital is the ultimate acid test for the WTA final in Singapore, which begins next Sunday.
When she announced it ten days ago, it was already clear that French Open winner Simona Halep would do everything in her power to achieve the great goal of Singapore. Independent of the devastating diagnosis “herniated disc”.
“I discussed this with my team and my family – and we decided that I would play in the WTA final,” Halep told the Romanian news agency News.ro.
At the tournament in Beijing at the end of September, the industry leader had to give up her opening match against Ons Jabeur from Tunisia after a 6-1 draw in the first set. Shortly before, the complaints had occurred after an “unfortunate movement” during training with the Czech Petra Kvitova.
In the days that followed, several doctors made the initially sobering diagnosis. But despite the pain Halep decided against an immediate end to the season and now thanks to a wildcard even at the Kremlin Cup this week to start. From Russia, the 27-year-old twittered a photo on which she opened. She wrote: “So far everything is going well in Moscow”.
After a walk-through, Halep, who won the 2013 hard court tournament, will have to deal with either Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (Russia) or Australian Ajla Tomljanovic.
For Paris Champion Filly Halep, Moscow will be the ultimate acid test of back support. The big goal for the Romanian folk heroine is to defend her world number one position in Singapore and to return the favor for her weak performance in the WTA final in 2017.
At last year’s season’s final event, Halep had missed the jump to the semi-finals as the leader of the WTA rankings after two defeats and a win in the group stage.