Maria Sharapova vs Garbine Muguruza Tennis Prediction

Maria Sharapova moves into the quarterfinals after her much-anticipated encounter with Serena Williams could not come to pass as the American pulled out of the tournament. This is Sharapova’s ninth quarterfinal at Paris from 14 main draw appearances (5-3).
The five-time slam champion started her campaign with a shaky win over qualifier and #133 Richel Hogenkamp, trailing the decider by 0-3. She compensated for that by hammering Karolina Pliskova, 6-2 6-1, hitting 15 winners to the sixth seed’s five in 59 minutes.
Sharapova is a two-time French Open champion, lifting the title in 2012 (completing her career slam, d. Errani) and 2014 (d. Halep). However, she arrived at Stade Roland Garros this fortnight having missed the last two editions as a result of her suspension.
A month ago, the Russian was on a four-match losing streak for the first time in 15 years. But, she did find some confidence-boosting results on the outdoor clay events, a quarterfinal at Madrid (d. Mladenovic) and a semifinal at Rome (d. Ostapenko).
Garbine Muguruza also gets an easy pass to the quarterfinal after her opponent Lesia Tsurenko retired due to injury, trailing 0-2 in the first set. This is the Spaniard’s fourth quarterfinal at the French Open (1-2), converting the last one to her first slam triumph in 2016.
Muguruza has already met two former slam champions in the early rounds this fortnight, Svetlana Kuznetsova (7-6 6-2 in two hours) and Sam Stosur (6-0 6-2 in an hour). Interestingly enough, she also defeated these two particular players during her 2016 slam run.
Muguruza had a 2-2 clay season before Paris, including a three-hour loss to Gavrilova at Rome. However, pre-slam results have never been a good indicator of her success at a major. In 2017, she fell to Strycova 6-1 6-0 at Eastbourne before winning Wimbledon.
The Russian leads the pair’s head-to-head record by 3-0. However, in their last two encounters, which both happened in 2014 at the French Open (quarterfinal) and Montreal (second round), Sharapova had to recover from a set deficit to prevail over Muguruza.

Tennis Prediction: Maria Sharapova
Odds: 2.15