French Open: Top 5 contenders for the women’s singles title

#3 Garbine Muguruza

Her free-flowing fast-paced groundstrokes might be tailor-made for the grass but World No. 4 Garbine Muguruza does have two quarter-final runs in Paris. The first of these impressive performances came two years back when she shocked the tennis world by handing a straight-sets defeat to Serena.

The Spanish No. 1 did back it up with another last-eight finish in 2015. The 22-year-old is blessed with fine movement on the court and can be at her devastating best when she is thinking clearly.

Her clarity of thoughts went missing in the early part of the season when she clearly reeled under the pressure after a stellar 2015. She failed to reach a single semi-final until the Italian Open last week.

Her revival definitely could not have come at a better time. At Rome, she showed all the facets of her game that can make her a dangerous opponent any day. If the Spaniard can play with the same calmness at Roland Garros, she is a player nobody would like to face.

2016 Draw: She is in the bottom half of the draw and has Petra Kvitova in her quarter while Simona Halep or Agnieszka Radwanska will be her likely opponent in the semis.

French Open performance:

Best result: Quarter-finals

Last year: Quarter-finals

About the author

Sudeshna is a veteran Indian Sports and International Tennis journalist as well as editor at Sportskeeda. She has an overall experience of over 10 years with top publications like The Bridge, Fox Sports Asia, and gained a keen interest in Indian sports since the 2002 Commonwealth and Asian Games when she was in school.

Sudeshna holds a Master's degree in Journalism and Mass Communication. She attends tournaments regularly and being a highly experienced journalist, she ensures she only contacts the correct people from her network for the most authentic information to be put in her articles.

Sudeshna’s favorite Indian athlete is PV Sindhu owing to her big-tournament performances. She also admires Tennis legend Rafael Nadal for his resilience and has witnessed the Spaniard in action at the French Open, due to which, Roland Garros is her all-time favorite Grand Slam tournament.

Neeraj Chopra’s gold medal win at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics made a lasting impact on Sudeshna. She has also interviewed him along with Badminton star Chirag Shetty and several other sports personalities. She has done on-ground reporting on multiple ITF tournaments along with the Premier Badminton League, Asian Boxing Championships and the Davis Cup.

When not using her skills and years of experience in crafting compelling content, Sudeshna likes to read, watch movies and travel.

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Edited by Staff Editor