Ухань: Пресс-конференция Марии

"I’ve been working hard to get myself ready to compete again & I can’t wait to get back out." C’mon @MariaSharapova!

Мария сказала, что ей очень нравиться новый корт.

The Russian met the press ahead of her much-anticipated comeback in Wuhan. "Obviously I have missed playing in many tournaments in the last few months, and as I was getting healthy and preparing and training, this tournament worked out really well in my schedule," she said. "There is no reason why I wouldn’t play." "I didn’t have the best result at this tournament last year," Sharapova said. "That’s definitely something I would like to change this week." Sharapova, the No.2 seed in Wuhan behind Halep, gets a bye in the first round and then begins against either Barbora Strycova or Hungarian qualifier Timea Babos. "You can never underestimate an opponent, seeded or not," Sharapova said. "There aren’t any easy matches and I believe many of the Top 20 are here, so you know there’s going to be top quality tennis. "You can’t look at any match and say, ’That will be an easy match.’" The post-US Open season has always been a strong one for Sharapova, though. Nine of her 34 career WTA titles have come after the last Grand Slam event of the year - five of those have come in Asia.