Back at Wimbledon a year after her maiden Grand Slam appearance, Jessica Bouzas Maneiro faces the daunting task of playing last year's champion, Marketa Vondrousova, in the first round.
The unseeded player is the unquestionable underdog against the holder, who seeks to become the first woman since Serena Williams (2015, 2016) to retain the women's singles title.
Match preview
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Maneiro returns to Wimbledon circa a year after making her first Slam appearance in the 2023 Championships, keen to avoid the same outcome of an early exit.
Having made it through qualifying, the Spanish lost in straight sets to last year's 26th seed Anhelina Kalinina, seeing her debut end in disappointment.
The 21-year-old may not have required qualifying this time around, but she faces a sterner test in this year's first-round match as she pits her wits against the winner from 2023.
It does not help that Maneiro's pre-Wimbledon preparation has her carrying little or no momentum, underscored by losing in the first round of a Challenger event to Anca Todoni in her only grass-court match before the Championships.
It remains to be seen if the youngster with first-round exits at Wimbledon 2023 and this year's French Open shows something different against the defending champion.
For Vondrousova, the task facing the Czechia player is greater due to the pressure of recent winners failing to replicate the previous year's performance.
The No. 6 seed won last year's tournament, making history as the first unseeded player in the Open Era to reign supreme in the women's singles event.
However, she now faces either emulating the retired Williams as the recent player to retain her Wimbledon title or be the next champion not to hold onto the women's crown, joining Garbine Muguruza, Angelique Kerber, Simona Halep (withdrew in 2021 due to a calf injury), Ashleigh Barty and Elena Rybakina.
Vondrousova's path to any consecutive title at the Championships is thorny, evidenced by the presence of world No. 1 Iga Swiatek, 2022 winner Rybakina, two-time runner-up Ons Jabeur, Jelena Ostapenko and 2018 champion Kerber.
Having been placed on the ostensibly more challenging side of the draw, Vondrousova hopes to avoid a shock early exit and build momentum before the tricky ties come around.
Head To Head
Maneiro and Vondrousova will play for the first time on Tuesday, with the Spaniard hoping to surprise the defending champion.
The unseeded player outdoes Vondrousova for wins in 2024 — 35-16 — but that statistic comes with the caveat of the 21-year-old's participation in the developmental ITF Tour.
The younger player has a 73% win rate this season (35 wins from 48 singles matches), superior to the Czech player's 62% (16 wins from 26).
We say: Vondrousova to win in two sets
Despite the pressure of looking to avoid an embarrassing early exit, Vondrousova's experience and sheer on-court superiority should help her dispatch the unseeded Maneiro with ease to inflict a third consecutive first-round loss on the Spaniard to follow last year's Wimbledon and the 2024 French Open.
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