Andreeva wasn’t just playing her first career match in Miami, she was also playing Kudermetova, a former Top 10 player, for the first time—but she passed both tests with flying colors, reeling off the first nine games for a 6-0, 3-0 lead before Kudermetova finally held to get on the board, and she held her next service game too, but that was it as Andreeva broke again in the final game to seal a 68-minute victory.
“Honestly, I felt like I still need a little bit more time to get used to the conditions, so I just tried to put as many balls in the court as I can, and tried to defend,” she said afterwards. “She was serving great and hitting really deep and great shots, so I just had to hang in there.
“But it felt good, I’ll be honest.”
Andreeva finished the match with 15 winners to 9 unforced errors.
It wasn’t just her 20th win of the year, it was also her 13th win in a row, a streak entirely at the WTA 1000 level—she went 6-0 to win Dubai and 6-0 to win Indian Wells, the two biggest titles of her career.
