In the second match of the day on Tuesday, Petra Kvitova and Agnieszka Radwanska will play each other for the first time in 2014.  Their last match was also at the WTA Championships in 2013 where Kvitova won in two sets, 6-4 6-4.  Since winning her second Grand Slam title at Wimbledon with a simply awesome display in the final against Eugenie Bouchard, Kvitova’s form has been encouraging.  It was an interesting dynamic to see if Kvitova could become more of a threat on a consistent basis and although there have been some disapppointments (her loss against Elina Svitolina at Cincy still haunts me) Petra has played much better through the second half of the season compared to the first half up to Wimbledon.  Kvitova had an excellent run in Asia, winning Wuhan and reaching the final of Beijing.

Radwanska’s form hasn’t been so rosy; A title in Montreal was interspersed between some disappointing losses.  In Asia where she has had some excellent results in the past couple of years, Radwanska went 3-3 with losses to Varvara Lepchenko (Seoul), Caroline Garcia (Wuhan) and Roberta Vinci (Beijing).  Heading into the WTA Tour Championships, Radwanska’s form has been the most questionable of the eight and although she has beaten all the players in her group in the last two years, she is the underdog.

Kvitova leads the H2H with Radwanska 5-1.  Radwanska’s sole win against Kvitova came in the first match of the 2012 WTA Championships at Istanbul.  Kvitova was struggling with a virus and limped out of the tournament after losing 6-3 6-2.  There’s no doubt that if Kvitova plays a solid match, she will win this match.  I think Radwanska will have to rely on an error-strewn performance from Petra to have a chance of prevailing…

Prediction: Kvitova d. Radwanska in 2 sets

Poll Result Day 1: Thanks to everyone who voted in the Halep v Bouchard poll… after over 200 votes, 68% correctly predicted that Halep would beat Bouchard.  Well done to the majority!