The second Grand Slam of the year is practically underway, as the qualifying stage of the Roland Garros 2023 starts today. 128 players in both WTA in ATP competitions got contained in the draws, which will emerge the 16 qualifiers into the main draw, which are about to be revailed on Thursday's evening. The main draw action, as usual in Paris, start on Sunday.
Camila Osorio is the top seed of the qualies stage, being quite unlucky to be the first player who missed the main draw cut-off by a little margin. The Colombian, who performed a good run in the recent WTA 1000 event in Rome, starts her qualies campaign from the match against Raluka Serban. The road to main draw can be quite tough for the top seed, as Osorio can meet Mirra Andreeva in the final round. The 16 years-old, who was a sensation of WTA 1000 Madrid tournament, plays against her fellowcountry Polina Kudermetova in first round.
Lucrezia Stefanini is the second seed, being placed in a really interesting section. The Italian starts the qualies from the match against Maja Chwalinska. Another seed there is Kaja Juvan, who can meet Taylor Townsend in the potential 2nd round's clash. The American advanced into 3rd round in Rome and reached out the final of WTA 125 challenger in Florence, which boosted her rank by 60 places in just 2 weeks. Only one of those names can be lucky to make it through into main draw.
Arantxa Rus is the seed number three, being a favorite in a quite of formidable section of the draw. Tamara Zidansek, seeded with #4, is placed together with the names like Chloe Paquet and Aliona Bolsova. Another notable names in the top half of the draw are Laura Siegemund - seeded with #6, but the third most successful player from the qualies field this year, who is ranked 63th in the WTA race list, Brenda Fruhvirtova, or Katie Boulter.
Sofia Kenin is the biggest name of the bottom half. The Australian Open 2020 champion, who have used multiple protection ranking entries and wild cards for the tournaments on the biggest stage to come back into contention on top level, is seeded with #23, and starts her qualies campaign from the match against local wild card receiver, Marqaux Rouvroy. Kenin should be a favorite in her section and is expected to capitalize on her good progress made recently. The American is the highest ranked player in the WTA race out of all the qualifying participants, on 50th place, just after performing one of the biggest sensations of the season by upsetting the WTA race leader Aryna Sabalenka in the 2nd round of WTA 1000 in Rome.
The last section of the draw is quite stacked. Apart from the seeded players - Marina Bassols Ribera (#16) and Greet Minnen (#25), there are the players like Dayana Yastremska, 4th highest ranked qualies player in the WTA race (71th place) and two Romanian players, who set up one of the most intriguing matches of the opening round - Elena Gabriela Ruse and Jaqueline Cristian.
Here is the full Roland Garros 2023 WTA qualifying draw -> LINK
