Rebeka Masarova and Simona Waltert qualify for the main draw of the clay court tournament in Rome. By contrast, Leandro Riedi, Switzerland's last hope in the men's tournament, was eliminated early.
05.05.2026, 18:22
SDA
In the second and final round of qualifying, it came down to a Swiss duel, which Masarova (WTA 160) won 1:6, 6:1, 6:1 against Jil Teichmann (WTA 196). The 26-year-old from Basel and the two-year-older from Seeland were facing each other for the first time on the WTA Tour.
Waltert (WTA 91) faced elimination several times against the Chinese player Yuan Yue (WTA 115). In the decisive third set, the player from Graubünden was trailing 3:5 and fended off four match points. Thanks to a great effort of will, she won four games in a row and thus reached the main draw of the WTA 1000 tournament in the Italian capital for the first time.
This means that four Swiss women are represented in Rome. Belinda Bencic (WTA 12), who will meet former US Open winner Bianca Andreescu from Canada in the second round after a walk-through, and Viktorija Golubic (WTA 90) were directly in the main draw.
The men's tournament, on the other hand, will take place without Swiss participation. After Stan Wawrinka, who withdrew, Leandro Riedi (ATP 128) lost to the Argentinian Francisco Comesaña (ATP 114) in three sets in the second qualifying round.
