Tennis in the Land Returns for its 5th edition – The WTA 250 tournament in Cleveland kicks off today and runs through August 23 on the hard courts of the Nautica Entertainment Complex. It has found the place in calendar in a week prior the US Open, where some of the players still want to get some valuable ranking points and match practice before heading into Flushing Meadows. It's a prize pool of $275,094, the champion will earn 250 ranking points and a $31,565 winner's check. The field is quite strong with 7 players from the top 50 of WTA rankings. Here is the breakdown of main draw complemented with data analysis chart.
Samsonova leads the top half with revelations of the season
Liudmila Samsonova enters as the top seed. The 26-year-old Russian currently sits at 18th in the WTA rankings and has had a solid but somewhat disappointing season. In 2025, she reached the final in Strasbourg but her recent form has been concerning after an early exit in Cincinnati to Taylor Townsend. Despite having decent campaigns on clay and grass, Samsonova's season on hard courts is up and down with the run into semifinals in Adelaide, quarterfinals in Indian Wells, but three first match exits in a row since then with 9 wins and 10 losses in general. Worth noting that she won one of her five WTA titles right here in Cleveland back in 2022. Samsonova already sets up a very interesting clash against Caroline Dolehide in the first round.
The most intriguing potential quarterfinal in this section features Maya Joint (3) versus Lois Boisson (5). The 19-year-old Australian Joint is the absolute revelation of the season - she's already won two WTA 250 titles in Rabat and Eastbourne showing she can excel on different surfaces. Joint has an interesting match-up against Eva Lys in first round - the rising player from Germany, currently ranked 62th in WTA list. Lois Boisson is another sensation of 2025, however it's the mystery how well can the French play on hard, because all of her big success came from clay. The 22-year-old stunned the tennis world at Roland Garros, reaching the semifinals as a wild card ranked No. 361, defeating Jessica Pegula and Mirra Andreeva along the way. Following her French Open heroics, she captured her first WTA title in Hamburg on clay. She has not played a single match on outdoor hard courts since the year 2022, which is quite a shocking stat.
Potapova, Wang and the Brits headline the bottom half
Anastasia Potapova (4) seems to be the most potent player in a bottom section. The 24-year-old Russian won the Cluj-Napoca title this year and has a decent season record of 20-13, which shows consistency, though she lacks stability at the highest level. Potapova showed up in some rollercoaster matches this year, capturing two wins from saving match points. Last week in Cincinnati was the breakthrough for the Russian who stopped the rot of 4 consecutive first round exits on hard courts. The first stop for Potapova can be a tricky one, as she faces the American youngster Iva Jovic - one of the revelations of the tournament in Cincinnati, where she scraped through qualifiers up until the third round.
Xin Yu Wang is the highest seed there. The Chinese is on a great run of form in recent two months, being a surprising runner-up in WTA 500 in Berlin on grass. In last month, she approached the semifinals in Prague on hard courts - WTA 250 grade same as Cleveland. She can set up the potential quarterfinal match-up against another exciting name from this section - the 7th seed Katie Boulter. The Brit received a wild card, playing there, trying to turn over the series of 5 defeats in a row on hard courts before the start of US Open. This season is a disappointing one for Boulter, who claimed her first career's WTA 500 title in San Diego last year on hard and achieved career's highest 23th place in rankings. This year is a disappointing one for the 29 years-old who dropped down into 50th place in rankings, still having a hefty amount of points to defend in the fall, from the Asian campaign in the remainder of the 2024 season.
Sonay Kartal is another Brit to watch in the bottom half of the draw. The 23 years-old is on the opposite direction with Boulter regarding progress, debuting in the top 50 this year. Kartal also waits for the win on hard courts since a long time - her last main draw victory came in Indian Wells where she approached the round of 16. Kartal was almost unbeatable last year on hard courts in ITF level competitions, winning 20 matches in a row and then translating it into maiden WTA title in Monastir in September, which strenghened her stunning record of 30 wins in 33 matches on hard in 2024.
Here is the heatmap of the top 10 players from the field including their stats on hard courts in 2025, sorted by the TennisRatio Power Index, averaging the general performance of the players.
