Analysis for Radwanska-Zheng (WTA Beijing)

Head-to-head record 2:0

Polish young gun Agnieszka Radwanska will play Chinese Jie Zheng in the first round at Beijing tournament. Zheng already proved that she is able to beat even the world class players - At Wimbledon in 2008, Zheng gained recognition by becoming the first Chinese player ever to reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament, defeating world number one Ana Ivanovic en route. She has won three career WTA singles titles: Hobart in 2005, Estoril, Portugal and Stockholm in 2006. Zheng is quick to spot opportunities to take the initiative, she hits many spectacular winners, and she runs like the wind. She is 29-13 this year and played well last week in Guangzhou where she was beaten in the 4th round by later winner, Vera Zvonareva of Russia. Zheng will face enigmatic Polish girl Agniezska Radwanska. She has a big talent but often fails to keep concentrated on the game. She has excellent footwork and footspeed on all surfaces. Lack of consistency has been said to be her ultimate weakness. However, when Radwanska is mentally focused, she possesses a very powerful all-round game that is capable of defeating the best players in the world on virtually any surface. Even if her latest results weren´t bad, her mental condition won´t be ideal after the last week´s demolition by Petrova. At the Olympics in Beijing, Radwanska was seeded eighth but lost in the second round to Francesca Schiavone and she was seeded ninth at the US Open and lost to seventh-seeded Venus Williams in the fourth round. Within the normal conditions, Radwanska would be the favourite for us but having a look at the latest results we think that Zheng will be more than competitive in front of the Chinese crowd. Odds above 2.3 are worth considering here.