JUST six of a possible 24 qualifying seeds are through to the main draw of the Western & Southern Open’s WTA Tour main draw, while the ATP event had a remarkable four make it through qualifying.

Looking at the WTA Tour side of things, the youth of the Tour continued to impress today with some of the most exciting youngsters making their way into the main draw. Canadian teen, Leylah Fernandez made her way through to the main draw with a 6-4 6-1 triumph over American Kristie Ahn, while recently turned 20-year-old Ann Li also made it through with an impressive 6-3 7-6 win over Viktoria Kuzmova. CiCi Bellis‘ return to the circuit continued with a huge come-from-behind win over Belgian Ysaline Bonaventure, one of four American qualifiers through to the Round of 64. The other two were other seeded qualifiers in Jessica Pegula and Cristina McHale.

Top seeded qualifier and Top Seed Open finalist Jil Teichmann made it to the main draw with a win over Shelby Rogers for the second time in a week, again defeating her in straight sets 6-3 6-4 after doing it in the Lexington semi-final. Aside from the trio of Americans, the other top ranked players to survive qualifying were fifth seed Laura Siegemund, seventh seed Arantxa Rus and 12th seed Kirsten Flipkens. Other qualifiers were Russian duo, Vera Zvonareva and Anna Kalinskaya, and Frenchwoman Oceane Dodin.

WTA TOUR QUALFIERS:

Vera Zvonareva (RUS)
Arantxa Rus (NED)
Ann Li (USA)
Anna Kalinskaya (RUS)
Leylan Fernandez (CAN)
CiCi Bellis (USA)
Oceane Dodin (FRA)
Kirsten Fllipkens (BEL)
Laura Siegemund (GER)
Jil Teichmann (SUI)
Cristina McHale (USA)
Jessica Pegula (USA)

In their first event since March, the ATP Tour’s qualifying draw produced a number of upsets on the final day of that stage, with plenty of lowly ranked competitors making it through to the Round of 64 at New York. The highest ranked player to make it through to the first round of the main draw was Aljaz Bedene, with the fourth seed just getting past Austrian Dennis Novak, 4-6 6-3 6-4. He joined Marton Fucsovics, Cameron Norrie and Ricardas Berankis as the seeds through to the next stage of the tournament.

Top seeded qualifier, Gilles Simon had a shock loss to American wildcard, Sebastian Korda. The 54th ranked Frenchman looked good in the opening set then won just one game in the final two sets to lose 3-6 6-0 6-1 against the 224th ranked 20-year-old Korda. Another lowly ranked American in 271st ranked Mackenzie McDonald also booked his spot in the main draw with a 6-7 7-5 7-6 victory over German Dominik Koepfer, while fellow wildcard J.J. Wolf defeated up-and-coming Spaniard Jaume Munar in a come-from-behind 2-6 6-4 6-4 victory to also add to the American representation. Other winners through to the main draw were Emil Ruusuvuori, Salvatore Caruso, Marcos Giron and Norbert Gombos who all saluted in the second round of qualifying.

ATP TOUR QUALIFIERS:

Sebastian Korda (USA)
Emil Ruusuvuori (FIN)
Ricardas Berankis (LTU)
Aljaz Bedene (SLO)
Mackenzie McDonald (USA)
Marton Fucsovics (HUN)
Salvatore Caruso (ITA)
Cameron Norrie (GBR)
Marcos Giron (USA)
Lloyd Harris (RSA)
J.J Wolf (USA)
Norbert Gombos (SVK)

Tomorrow’s action at New York kicks off with a massive day on the Grandstand Court, starting with Ekaterina Alexandrova up against ninth seed, Elena Rybakina in one of the matches of the day. Following that, 13th seed Maria Sakkari tackles American young gun Coco Gauff. Wrapping up the day session, wildcard duo Frances Tiafoe and Andy Murray do battle, before 16th seed Dayana Yastremska and American wildcard Venus Williams go at it, and Canandian 12th seed Denis Shapovalov and Croatian Marin Cilic light up the night session.

Other matches not to be missed on the first day of action at New York include German Jan-Lennard Struff up against Australian Alex de Minaur, American duo Alison Riske and Amanda Anisimova doing battle, and the big serving Sam Querrey and Milos Raonic lock horns.