2021 Porsche Tennis Grand Prix Odds & Preview: Petra Kvitova Looks to Defend Her Title

• The Stuttgart Open, also known as the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix begins Monday, April 19th
• 2019 champion Petra Kvitova will look to defend her title in Germany
• Take a look below for the Top 20 player odds to win outright, as well as what players you might want to keep an eye out for this week

The Women’s Stuttgart Open, also known as the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix, will begin with main draw play on Monday, April 19th, and features one of the strongest main draw fields in its history. Four of the top five players, and 7 top 10 players, are set to appear this week in Germany. A notable name you won’t be seeing is Naomi Osaka.

Odds as of April 18th from DraftKings

Ashleigh Barty, Simona Halep, Elina Svitolina, and Sofia Kenin are the top four seeds and will be receiving first-round byes.

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The Favorite

Ashleigh Barty has held the World No. 1 ranking for some time now, and there’s good reason for it. She’s usually a favorite in any tournament she enters, and this one is no different. Making her debut at the Stuttgart Open, the Australian enters the tournament with the best odds to win with +350 odds.

She leads the way in the very strong first half of the draw that consists of Svitolina, Pliskova, and Kvitova to just name a few.

Barty will open her tournament up against either former champion Laura Siegemund or a qualifier. Chances are she’ll face Siegemund who will be a tough task. Clay is a surface that Siegemund has found a lot of success on, not to mention, a title here.

Defending Champ

Due to COVID-19, the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix didn’t take place in 2020, so Petra Kvitova comes into the tournament defending her 2019 title. She’s the seventh seed this week, and will open her tournament up against Jennifer Brady.

Kvitova currently holds a 2-0 head-to-head record against the American. If she were to win her opening match, she would be scheduled to play either Maria Sakkari or Andrea Petkovic. It’s safe to say that Kvitova won’t have an easy route to repeating as champion, as she’s arguably in the most competitive part of the draw.

Could Kvitova repeat as champion? Never say never. The 31-year old already has a title under her belt in 2021 – she beat Garbine Muguruza at the Qatar Total Open in March. But aside from that title win, she has only been able to get as far as the Round of 16 in other tournaments she’s participated in this year.

Previous Porsche Tennis Grand Prix Winners

Not only is defending champion Kvitova participating in the tournament this year, but so are the other three champions listed above.

Who To Watch

With the amount of talent that’s competing in this year’s tournament, there are a number of players to watch this week.

Halep enters this tournament after she withdrew from the Miami Open due to a shoulder injury. After a couple weeks of rehab, it looks like she’s back and ready, and has had about a week of practice on clay. But it’s something to keep an eye on. She most likely won’t get truly tested until the later rounds, but it’s possible she’ll see Marketa Vondrousova, who was a 2019 French Open finalist, in the second round.

Ready for the red dirt 💪@Simona_Halep is back on court and preparing for the upcoming clay-court season! pic.twitter.com/bj4Y72tJlf

— Billie Jean King Cup (@BJKCup) April 12, 2021

Maria Sakkari and Anett Kontaveit are possible dark horses here. No one has a straightforward path to the finals, and these two might be able to catch their higher seeded and ranked opponents on their heels. If Kontaveit wins her opening match, she’ll take on Sofia Kenin. Kenin had a fairly strong start to 2021, but her last four appearances have been less than impressive, having not advanced past the Round of 32.

Sakkari has had three semifinal appearances just this year, and assuming she runs into Kvitova in the second round, their current head-to-head is split at 2 wins a piece. If she were to make it to the quarterfinals, and possibly face Svitolina, she actually leads their head-to-head 2-1, with their last meeting coming in 2020.

Best Bets

Since Barty and Halep are in opposite halves of the draw, it’s possible we get a finals match between the two. If it comes to that, I would say Halep would be the one to beat there. She led the 2020 clay court power rankings with a total score of 6591.50. Barty made her clay court power rankings debut last year with a score of 2599.75.

It’s safe to save that Halep has been quite dominant on clay. Last year alone she added two more clay court titles to her resume, and held a 74.3 winning percentage on the court surface.

Best Bet: Halep (+400)