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FollowPreview: Sunday at Indian Wells
Sunday at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, CA, the WTA will begin its third round, while the ATP wraps up its second.
Serena Williams [20] already fought her way through one Slam winner, Victoria Azarenka, in her second-round match, and now faces another in her third-round. The American leads the head to head with Garbiñe Muguruza [10] with a 3-2 margin. Their last match was the 2016 Roland Garros final, which Muguruza won 7-5, 6-4. Their last match on hard court was the 2015 Australian Open 2015 Round of 16, which Williams won in three sets.
Williams is looking forward to testing herself against higher ranked players, as she continues her return to tennis as a mother on a reduced schedule: “It will be good. I haven't played her in a while. I think tonight [against Azarenka] was a good match to get me ready for that, and I'm ready. I feel like this is what I want, so I'm ready for the next round.”
Muguruza too understood the potential for a great match that would test her strength and skill under pressure. “I think it's very good match to have. That's the matches that I feel are exciting, that I want to play, that it could be any final.”
The ATP’s top stars will get to play their first matches here on Sunday, facing less tested players. American wild card Jared Donaldson will take on Rafael Nadal [2] for only their second meeting. They played each other in the 2017 Shanghai Masters, a match the Spaniard won 6-2, 6-1. The 22-year-old from Rhode Island only played three matches this year and lost two of them.
Roger Federer [4] will get his bearing on the courts here in his second-round match against 29-year-old German Peter Gojowczyk. Their paths only crossed once before, in the 2018 Western & Southern Open, where the Swiss player won 6-4, 6-4.