While all eyes of the tennis world will be on the women's singles final between Victoria Azarenka and Maria Sharapova on Saturday, the future of women’s tennis will be on show earlier in the day.
The girl’s final will open proceedings on women’s finals day, with Russian number four seed Yulia Putintseva facing American 14th seed Taylor Townsend.
Both girls will be looking to emulate the feat of Azarenka, who claimed the junior title back in 2005. Seven years later she is competing for the women’s title.
Putintseva will head into the final as favourite, and currently trains under the guidance of tennis legend Martina Hingis at the Mouratoglou Academy in Paris.
Hingis looks after five girls at the academy, but when quizzed about which one had the potential to reach the top five in the world, she said one stood out.
“It’s a global consulting thing, so we’ll see how it’s going to evolve in the future. But there is definitely the junior girl who is playing here also, Yulia Putintseva,” she said.
“Hopefully she can go all the way.”
Putintseva accounted for number two seed Eugenie Bouchard from Canada earlier today.
After fighting her way to a 7-5 first set in 74 minutes, she cruised through the second set 6-1, booking her spot in the final.
Townsend also had a hard-fought victory today, taking out fellow countrywoman Krista Hardbeck 7-6(3) 6-4.
It has been a successful tournament for Townsend, who is also competing in the final of the girl’s doubles.
Her partner is Gabrielle Andrews, also from America and they play top seeds Irina Khromacheva (RUS) and Danka Kovinic (MNE).
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