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Ready? Set. Go! It’s Round of 16 time at the Miami Open and we’re previewing all eight must-see matchups right here at WTATennis.com.

Monday

Round of 16

[2] Karolina Pliskova (CZE #3) vs. [15] Barbora Strycova (CZE #20)
Head-to-head: Tied, 1-1
Key Stat: Pliskova leads the tour with 175 aces in 22 matches thus far this season.

Karolina Pliskova took over the WTA lead with her 21st win of the season this weekend, and the 25-year-old is happy that she’s finding ways to win even when she isn’t playing her best tennis. She had to battle the ever feisty Yulia Putintseva and a three-hour rain delay on Saturday, eventually emerging with a 7-5, 6-3 victory.

“I’m happy that I went through, and think I need these matches, the hard ones,” she said after the match. “Not only to win easy matches, but also the ones were I don’t feel really well like today.”

Will she have another tough one on Monday when she faces fellow Czech Barbora Strycova? The 30-year-old has been steady all year, but has lost her last eight against the Top 10.

Pick: Pliskova in three

[4] Dominika Cibulkova (SVK #4) vs. Lucie Safarova (CZE #36)
Head-to-head: Cibulkova leads, 5-2
Key Stat: Cibulkova has won just four of nine three-set matches in 2017.

A pair of proven WTA commodities will look to sail into the quarterfinals on Monday when Dominika Cibulkova and Lucie Safarova square off for the eighth time. Cibulkova has held sway over the pair’s head-to-head, but since 2014 they’ve split their four meetings. Cibulkova breezed past Kirsten Flipkens in straight sets on Saturday while Safarova rolled past Ajla Tomljanovic behind six breaks of serve in eight return games. It is the Slovakian who carries the higher ranking into this meeting but don’t sleep on Safarova; the former World No.5 has racked up 15 wins already this season, and it feels like her best has yet to come.

Pick: Cibulkova in three

Dominika @Cibulkova did not let the three hour rain delay slow her down! #MiamiOpen pic.twitter.com/tCrz3x4jlU

— WTA (@WTA) March 26, 2017

[26] Mirjana Lucic-Baroni (CRO #29) vs. [WC] Bethanie Mattek-Sands (USA #158)
Head-to-head: First meeting
Key Stat: Lucic-Baroni is tied for the WTA lead in Top-10 wins in 2017.

Two surprising veterans are making big waves at this year’s Miami Open, but one of them will be sent packing on Monday as Mirjana Lucic-Baroni and Bethanie Mattek-Sands will match wits for the first time with a spot in the quarterfinals on the line. Mattek-Sands entered this year’s draw without a single tour-level win to her name in 2017. Three rounds later she has a Top 10 and a Top 20 scalp under belt.

Meanwhile, Lucic-Baroni’s fine form in 2017 continues. She blasted past No.5-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska behind 38 winners on Saturday to improve to 3-1 against the Top 10 this season and 11-4 overall.

Pick: Lucic-Baroni in three

[6] Garbiñe Muguruza (ESP #6) vs. [12] Caroline Wozniacki (DEN #14)
Head-to-head: Muguruza leads, 3-1
Key Stat: Muguruza has gone 7-1 in deciders this season (was 8-7 in 2016).

Like Karolina Pliskova, Spain’s Garbiñe Muguruza is taking comfort in her most difficult victories. At this year’s Miami Open she has already had a pair of them. She saved a match point on Friday to defeat Christina McHale and on Saturday she battled back from a set down to knock off China’s Zhang Shuai. While grueling, the wins have left Muguruza feeling confident about her abilities.

“Since I’ve started the year, I’ve had a lot of matches like this, and I’m expecting that every time I go on court,” Muguruza said. “A win is a win, I don’t wish to have matches this tough every day, but I’m very happy with the way I’m facing them.”

On Monday she’ll face another woman who knows a thing or two about grinding out hard-fought triumphs in No.12-seeded Caroline Wozniacki. The Dane comes in hot, having notched her 20th win of the season on Saturday night and should make life difficult for Muguruza yet again.

Pick: Muguruza in three

[1] Angelique Kerber (GER #1) vs. [Q] Risa Ozaki (JPN #87)
Head-to-head: First meeting
Key Stat: Kerber improved to 9-0 vs. players outside the Top 50 with her win over Shelby Rogers on Sunday.

Could it be that Angelique Kerber is starting to find that certain je ne sais quoi in her game? The World No.1 fought past American Shelby Rogers in straight sets and will look to continue her run against a surprise Round of 16 participant from Japan. 22-year-old Risa Ozaki qualified for the main draw and had to win two three-setters in a row before taking out Julia Goerges in straight sets on Sunday. On Monday her reward is her very first match against a Top 10 player. How will she handle the pressure? Whatever the outcome, Ozaki stands to benefit tremendously in the experience category from her run in Miami.

Pick: Kerber in two

[11] Venus Williams (USA #12) vs. [7] Svetlana Kuznetsova (RUS #7)
Head-to-head: Kuznetsova leads, 5-4
Key Stat: Williams is bidding for her 60th Miami Open win today.

It has been a decade since Svetlana Kuznetsova won her lone Miami title in 2006 and more than fifteen years since Venus Williams won the last of her three Miami Open titles in 2001, but these two legends of the game are still gunning for the game’s most coveted hardware, and very much in the running to win it all. On Monday they will meet for the tenth time and just the second time in the last seven years. Kuznetsova recorded a straight-sets win over Williams at Wuhan last year, and the Russian also took the pair’s only meeting in Miami in 2008. Is it time for Williams to take a bit of revenge, or will last year’s runner-up keep rolling in Miami?

Pick: Kuznetsova in three

[3] Simona Halep (ROU #5) vs. [14] Sam Stosur (AUS #19)
Head-to-head: Tied, 4-4
Key Stat: Halep has won back-to-back matches for the first time all season here in Miami.

It hasn’t been a banner year for Simona Halep or Sam Stosur – yet – but each could change the tone of their season significantly with a win on Monday when they clash for the ninth time. The pair have split their eight previous meetings – with Halep holding the 3-1 edge on hardcourts, where she has won the last three meetings.

But more importantly, both Halep and Stosur could really use a nice run in Miami to kickstart the remainder of their season. Stosur went 0 for Australia and is 3-5 against the Top 50 this season, but she notched a gritty three-set win over Peng Shuai on Sunday. Halep has won back-to-back matches for the first time this season in Miami and says she is pain-free and beginning to feel her game. With a prestigious quarterfinal on the line, it will be interesting to see which player comes up with the goods and claims a big win.

Pick: Halep in three

“I played my best tennis this year” -@Simona_Halep #MiamiOpen pic.twitter.com/HNTVf8WywX

— WTA (@WTA) March 27, 2017

[10] Johanna Konta (GBR #11) vs. Lara Arruabarrena (ESP #72)
Head-to-head: Arruabarrena leads, 1-0
Key Stat: Konta improved to 15-3 in 2017 with her third-round win over Pauline Parmentier.

Great Britain’s Johanna Konta has quietly put up a very impressive record in 2017. In just five events she has already racked up 15 wins, a title in Sydney and a quarterfinal at the Australian Open. In short, Konta appears to be prepared to back up her breakout 2016 with another wildly successful campaign. She’ll look to continue her positive momentum when she meets Spain’s Lara Arruabarrena for the first time since 2011. The Spaniard, who upset No. 8-seeded Madison Keys on Sunday, won that meeting (at an ITF event on clay), but it is Konta who will come in as the heavy favorite, based on her impressive run of play for 52 weeks and the fact that she will meet Arruabarrena on her favorite surface this time.

Pick: Konta in two

By the Numbers

4 – Number of unseeded players to reach the round of 16. 1

58 – Mattek-Sands, a former World No.30, is the lowest-ranked player remaining in the draw.

2010 – The year in which a wildcard made the best ever run – Justine Henin reached the semifinals.

36 – The age of the oldest player in this year’s draw, Venus Williams.

7 – The number of thirtysomethings into the round of 16 in Miami (Venus Williams, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, Bethanie Mattek-Sands, Sam Stosur, Barbora Strycova, Lucie Safarova)

INDIAN WELLS, CA, USA – Flashback five months ago. Casey Dellacqua and her doubles partner Yaroslava Shvedova had already qualified for the BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global. They were the third team to do so, qualifying third behind Hingis/Mirza and Safarova/Mattek-Sands not long after reaching the US Open final. Then came the freak fall on court at the China Open that would sideline the affable Aussie with a concussion, forcing her out of the Australian summer swing.

Still ranked No.4 in doubles, Dellacqua was cleared to play at the end of January and she returns to the tour this week at the BNP Paribas Open, playing doubles with her good friend, Sam Stosur. The quality pair have a mighty task against Co-No.1s Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza on Friday.

WTA Insider sat down with Dellacqua before the start of her tournament to talk about the difficulty of the last five months and how she hopes to get back on track.

WTA Insider: Can you just walk us through what happened in Beijing?
Dellacqua: I fell on court in the semifinals. I hit the back of my head and I kind of gave myself whiplash on the way down, so I had a lot of really bad neck pain, a lot of symptoms from the concussion, as well. It was a bit of a freak accident, really, and a bit of an unfortunate accident, because Slava and I had to miss the WTA Finals and had to miss a lot. Obviously, health is always a priority, but I suffered quite a lot from it.

I had symptoms like really, really bad headaches all the time. Any time I tried to do a little bit of exercise, I’d feel really dizzy and faint. I just was in a cloud of drowsiness. I couldn’t remember things, and I thought I’d be fine in a couple of weeks, but it actually got worse as time went on.

Then I just decided that my health was my priority, so this is my first tour event back. I played Fed Cup and played a 25K with Ash Barty a few weeks back. But this is my first WTA event back. It’s good to be back, but it did take a bit longer than I expected. It was just important, especially anything to do with the brain, that I was ready and fine to play again.

WTA Insider: Usually when a player is off tour it’s because of an injury that can be treated with surgeries, tape jobs, or medication. Concussions are a different beast. How do you actually “rehab” for a concussion?
Dellacqua: It’s just time, and that was a real frustrating thing. I’d keep saying, ‘I’m fine, I’m fine,’ and I kept doing all these tests with my doctor back home, and she was just ruling me out. It was up to her, really, in the end because it’s a bit negligent if they send me out there when I haven’t passed all the tests that needed to be done.

It was a really frustrating injury because I’ve obvious had a couple of big injuries before but yeah, you do rehab. This was really frustrating because I didn’t have a timeframe, and it was just about making sure that you’re healthy, and it’s hard to know when that is. It was kind of frustrating in that sense, and there wasn’t much I could do, except rest.

They just said it’s kind of like spraining your ankle, only you’ve sprained your brain a bit, and you need to let it settle. I thought I was losing the plot there for a while, because the brain’s so important; it controls everything. So I did think for a bit I was losing the plot, but I’m good now and they kept reassuring me that I was going to be fine and it’s just time.

WTA Insider: Since you didn’t have a timeframe on when you might be cleared to play, was there ever a time you thought your career might be over?
Dellacqua: I guess that was really frustrating because I’d had a really good year, as well. I just wanted to get back out there but then you start to doubt yourself, like, ‘I’ve had a couple of big injuries, I’m 31 in February,’ and the longer I’m out, the harder it is to get back. You start stressing, and that’s not going to help. I was having trouble sleeping, and it was just a vicious cycle.

It was really important for me to kind of just step away and make sure I got better because I certainly had doubts of like, ‘When am I going to feel right to get back out there?’ That stress of knowing the longer you are out, the harder it is. These girls are getting better, they’re faster, they’re stronger and one month is big. That was frustrating, as well.

At the moment, I am just going to focus a bit more on doubles. I do still want to play singles, but I’m probably still not right just yet to play both and manage that. I’ll play a bit of doubles just to get me back going, and look to play a bit more singles, but I’m just glad to be healthy.

WTA Insider: When did you get the all-clear?
Dellacqua: I went down to Melbourne for the Australian Open, and I was doing a little bit of a hit with Alicia Molik, the Fed Cup captain. I said, ‘Look, the doctor said that I was fine,’ and I’d done a little bit of physical activity and felt that I recovered ok.

Alicia was kind of like, ‘Do you think you’ll be ready for Fed Cup?’ and I was like, ‘Well, you tell me; I’ll practice and I’ll give you what I’ve got. If you think that’s good enough, then yes, I’m ready.’ I did some work down there, and did some doubles stuff with Cara Black, which was great, and went to Fed Cup. Just before Fed Cup, they kind of said that I was good.

WTA Insider: Were you able to do any training while you were still suffering from the concussion symptoms?
Dellacqua: The first couple of months, I was actually just resting a lot at home. Any time I’d even try to do grocery shopping, for example, or do things with [my son] Blake, I’d just get really headachy. For the first few months, I really didn’t do much, I was just at home recovering. I couldn’t even watch movies, so I was at home and it was frustrating. Any time I’d watch TV for 10 minutes, I’d get a headache.

I knew when I came back that I was going to have to work hard again. That’s why I’m just training, playing some doubles, and then increasing my load. I can’t go from doing that to doing a lot, because I’ll get injured again. I’m just trying to find a good balance of increasing my load, slowly, and making sure that I’m healthy along the way.

WTA Insider: Were you surprised you were able to win your first match back at Fed Cup and then make an ITF final with Ashleigh Barty?
Dellacqua: The Fed Cup was really crucial in the end, because we had to play a live rubber, and I hadn’t played a match since October, so I was like, ‘Way to throw me in the deep end!’

I was just really stoked because Sam was playing well; she’d won both her singles and I felt comfortable walking out there with here. We’ve known each other for a long time, so it was comforting to know that I could talk to her and just say like, ‘You’ve got to help me out; I haven’t played a match for a while.’ That was great; the Fed Cup gave me a lot of confidence to know that, ‘Ok, I haven’t played for four months, but I’m still ok.’ We played, and we won, and it was a pretty crucial match.

Then going to the ITF was great; we made the final. I didn’t know really what to expect. Ash hasn’t played for 18 months, I haven’t played for a bit. I just wanted to get consecutive matches. We made the final. I felt better then, coming here, knowing that I’ve played a few matches, as well. I think so far so good, and see how the year unfolds. So far, I’m good.

So proud of each member of this team ?? so happy to be able do my part in the doubs with my fellow old gal Sam ????? pic.twitter.com/lRQCvHvqYq

— caseydellacqua (@caseydellacqua) February 8, 2016

WTA Insider: Are these weeks in Indian Wells just an experiment to see where you’re at and then you’ll re-assess? Or do you have a schedule mapped out?
Dellacqua: I’m definitely going to play The Miami Open and Volvo Cars Open in Charleston, for sure. Then we’ve got another Fed Cup tie in Australia against America.

I’m pretty much ready to go. I’m just not sure when my singles will kick back in. I really want to try and really be ready for the grass circuit. When I can play singles – because my ranking’s at No.150 – when I can get in, I want to play now, but it’s going to be tough that my doubles ranking is higher. I’m just going to try to work it out and see where it goes.

WTA Insider: Usually players keep their off-day training light during tournaments. Are you continuing to train while you’re playing?
Dellacqua: If I was in tournament mode, I’d probably do a bit less than I have been doing. I’ve even been playing some singles points, in preparation for singles. I’ve just got a little bit more stuff to do in the gym, because I am just playing doubles and at these tournaments, you have a fair bit of time, sometimes, to have practice days.

It’s kind of a little bit like my pre-season as such, because I didn’t really do one. That and getting back into some point play. Anyone I practice with, I’m doing a lot more singles, actually. I’ve played a bit of practice doubles, but I’ve been doing more singles [practice].

Pretty pumped to be out hitting a few balls again! Can't wait to kickstart in Perth over the next fortnight☺️☺️#2.0 pic.twitter.com/94weIwYErG

— Ash Barty (@ashbar96) February 8, 2016

WTA Insider: Is your family able to travel with you?
Dellacqua: [My partner] Amanda’s pregnant again, so she’s 30 weeks. She’s too far along to travel, so she’s due in early May. Unfortunately, Blake couldn’t come. When I get home from Fed Cup – it’ll only be a few weeks – and then the next baby will be here. It’s going to be busy, but that’s why they couldn’t travel this time around.

Life’s about to get a bit more crazy, but that was a positive [from the concussion]. Obviously being out, I got to spend a lot of time at home with Blake, and help Amanda out, being pregnant, so that was great that I could give her a helping hand as well.

WTA Insider: So how does it feel to be back on tour?
Dellacqua: It’s pretty much same old, same old. It’s just the crazy tennis world. Nothing’s really changed too much; there’s a few new faces, actually, some girls that may have done well through the end of last year that I maybe haven’t seen, or maybe over the Australian Open. But there’s always girls coming up the ranks, playing better.

There’s still all of the other girls still playing, so not too much has changed. Because the only stuff I’ve missed was the Aussie Open and the pre-season, everything else was pretty much wrapped up, so I haven’t felt like I missed out on a big chunk of tournaments. I’ve only really missed the Aussie summer. In that sense, I think that’s good too.

All photos courtesy of Getty Images.

Tennis clothing companies typically make their product launches at Grand Slams, but some brands decided to release new designs at the Miami Open, and together with outfits from previous months that got in the spotlight this fortnight, we’re enjoying a fashionable tennis period.

Marija Zivlak of Women’s Tennis Blog will give us a quick overview of who’s been rocking the WTA courts in Miami:

Caroline Wozniacki debuted the red version of the adidas Summer Stella McCartney Sleeveless Polo and the adidas Summer Stella McCartney Pleated Skirt, which we had first seen in black and white on Garbiñe Muguruza during the BNP Paribas Open.

The slim-fit top offers high-end performance climalite® fabric that wicks sweat away and keeps players cool during long matches, while vintage charm is provided by ribbed details and polo collar. Adjustable front zipper in orange and generous side slits on the hem bring added flair and functionality.

The smooth jersey skirt and its crisp traditional pleats perfectly complement the polo’s retro feel. Ultimate comfort is provided by soft elastic waistband and inner tights that offer full coverage.

Just as in Indian Wells, Angelique Kerber rocked the mystery blue version of her lightweight Australian Open tank. The German World No.1 paired the airy top with the orange adidas Melbourne Skirt, whose discreet wrap design nicely matches the ocean-inspired layers of the tank. The sun bleached print of the integrated compression shorts brings an edge to this feminine look.

Simona Halep also looked amazing in adidas’ spaghetti-strap top and knit skirt, while during warmup we could see the stylish adidas Spring Advantage 3/4 Sleeve Top with one print sleeve and one solid color sleeve.

Venus Williams and EleVen have a new collection for practically every event, and while the tennis legend debuted the Intrepid collection in Indian Wells, at the very next tournament, in Miami, the Datura collection hits the courts. The EleVen Datura In Bloom Dress has an A-line fit, square neckline and contrast boomerang-shaped waistband.

Romania’s Patricia Maria Tig showcased several Tonic outfits during her Miami Open run which included wins over Heather Watson and seed No.22 Kristina Mladenovic, while my favorite was the colorful one we saw in the third round against Venus Williams.

The World No.95 energized the atmosphere with the Tonic Spring Statik Tank whose pinhole mesh print side panels match the print layer of the red Tonic Spring Ambition Skirt, which can be exposed more or less, depending on how tightly you tie the front ties. What’s also amazing is that both products offer UV protection and are made in Canada.

Tell us your favorites in the poll below!