The 50 shades of gray in the Montreal sky on Thursday afternoon didn’t lie. Play was suspended at 2:30 p.m. at the National Bank Open due to rain.
Action will not resume until 3:30 p.m., organizers said.
The second leg of the duel between the favorite, the Polish Iga Swiatek, and the Czech Karolina Muchova, 14th seed, had just ended when the showers started. Swiatek won the first set 6-1, while Muchova took the second 6-4. It was the first game of the day at the IGA stadium.
The winner of this duel will face the winner of the match scheduled for the start of the evening between Quebecer Leylah Annie Fernandez and American Danielle Collins. This duel is scheduled for 7 p.m., as the first game of the evening session, but the showers could upset the plans.
As of 2 p.m., Environment Canada predicted a 90% chance of showers or thunderstorms until 8 p.m. The weather radar does not bode well in the short term.
On Rogers Field, where the action began at 11 a.m., American Jessica Pegula (No. 4) easily beat Italian Jasmine Paolini 6-4, 6-0 in 69 minutes. In the next match, No. 10 Daria Kasatkina had won the first set 6-3 and was up 2-1 in the second set when the game was interrupted.
In the meantime, the main issue to watch will be the musical choices to fill the interruption. Some are expecting the classics Here Comes the Rain Again, Purple Rain and above all, November Rain, a hit capable of filling a good part of the break on its own. The turntable player could also surprise us by dusting off Blame in on the Rain, the success of Milli Vanilli which was a hit until the Franco-German duo fell out of favor.
