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Post by Admin on Oct 12, 2014 21:16:42 GMT
Alison Riske captured the first WTA title of her career on Sunday, holding off a late surge from WTA Rising Star Belinda Bencic to win the inaugural edition of the Tianjin Open. The No.6-seeded Riske - who had dropped just one game in her semifinal match against another WTA Rising Star, Zheng Saisai - came out swinging again a day later, her big serve and even bigger ground game launching her to a 6-3, 4-1 lead. The No.3-seeded Bencic wasn't about to go away, running off the next three games to even the second set, 4-all, and even getting to break point in the next game. But Riske regrouped just in time, holding serve then breaking once more to close it out, 6-3, 6-4. "It's a huge accomplishment for me to win my first WTA title," Riske said after the match, "and I was here by myself, which made it even more special, just to know that I was able to do it by myself. "I hope I can keep up the momentum and try to compete every week as best as I can." Riske also showed an even more gracious side when asked about Bencic's second set fightback. "Obviously there was a little momentum change in the second set," she said, "but that was because Belinda upped her level at that point. She's been playing so well this year and has a really bright future ahead of her. I knew coming into the match that it would be a battle and it really was." She was also asked about the tournament's motto: "Begin The Dream; Battle Your Heart". "I would look at it every day when I came in the door," the American said. "I was like, 'That's a really good saying.' I really liked it. And it's so true. It's just a great saying. They should hang that at every tournament!"
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Post by Admin on Oct 13, 2014 21:44:11 GMT
Samantha Stosur won the Japan Women's Open for a third time Sunday with a straight-sets triumph against Zarina Diyas in Osaka. The defending champion Stosur was broken in the first game by the 20-year-old from Kazakhstan, which set the tone for a tight opening set, but the No.1 seed drew on her power and experience to win 7-6 (9-7), 6-3. "Zarina played a very good match today," said Stosur, who had to rescue two set points in the tiebreak. "She managed to put me under a lot of pressure and returned serve really well. She gets to a lot of balls and can put you under pressure. You have to be out there and try to attack." Diyas, the No. 5 seed, had produced some flashes of brilliance in her first WTA final but couldn't capitalize when seemingly in control and was again unnerved by Stosur's competitive approach when leading 6-5 and 7-6 in the tiebreak. "Trying to serve out a set in a final, I don't know if maybe she was a little nervous but I tried to play a little bit more aggressive or put a bit more on my shots to make her come up with something else," Stosur said. The 30-year-old Australian, who didn't drop a set all week, wrapped up the championship with minimal fuss in the second set to collect her first WTA title of the season and sixth career title. Diyas chose to focus on the positives after a breakthrough week. "It was my first final so I am happy with how I played," she said. "She served very well, and it was tough, especially on those set points. But this was a great experience for me."
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Post by Admin on Oct 16, 2014 21:19:54 GMT
Lucie Safarova made a winning start to her Kremlin Cup quest on Wednesday, beating Ajla Tomljanovic to set up a quarterfinal clash against Russian great Svetlana Kuznetsova. The No.4-seeded Safarova dropped 15 aces on Tomljanovic and fought off all seven break points she faced in the match en route to a 7-6(4), 6-2 victory over the similarly-big-serving WTA Rising Star. "It was a good match for me," Safarova said. "I was serving really well in both sets. It was a really close set in the first set - the tie-break too - and I'm really happy I got through my first round." It's been a banner year for Safarova, highlighted by reaching her first Grand Slam semifinal at Wimbledon and setting a new career-high ranking of No.14 in the world last month after the US Open. She's now through to her fifth quarterfinal of the year, all five of them coming at Premier-level events or higher - Sydney, Charleston, Wimbledon, Tokyo [Pan Pacific] and now right here in Moscow. Awaiting Safarova in the quarterfinals will be the No.5 seed, Kuznetsova, who needed two hours and 41 minutes to get by Ukrainian qualifier Kateryna Kozlova, 3-6, 6-3, 6-3. After dropping the first set Kuznetsova went right to work, breaking early in the second and third sets en route to victory. Kuznetsova leads Safarova in their head-to-head series, 4-3, and she did win their only previous meeting this year as well, in the fourth round of the French Open. They're 3-3 on hardcourts though.
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Post by Admin on Oct 19, 2014 21:22:16 GMT
Sixth seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia won the WTA title at the Kremlin Cup tournament in Moscow on Sunday, beating Romania’s Irina-Camelia Begu in the final. The 23-year-old Pavlyuchenkova won 6-4, 5-7, 6-1 in 2 hours 28 minutes to record her second win over Begu, who is 61st in the WTA rankings, in as many meetings. She also became the fourth Russian woman in the tournament’s history to win the Kremlin Cup after Anastasia Myskina (who won it twice in 2003 and 2004), Anna Chakvetadze (2006) and Elena Dementieva (2007). The final got off to a nervy start that produced seven breaks of serve in the opening set before the 30th-ranked Pavlyuchenkova managed to settle down. The Russian pocketed the set in 50 minutes, but it was Begu, playing in her fourth WTA Tour final, who dominated the second set to break serve twice and level the match. In the deciding set Pavlyuchenkova again moved up a gear to break twice for a commanding 5-0 lead, taking her to the seventh title win of her career. “It’s just the best possible way to finish the season,” Pavlyuchenkova said at the award ceremony. “It was a really tough match. We were both fighting but somebody had to win. I just couldn’t have lost at home.”
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Post by Admin on Oct 30, 2014 21:09:59 GMT
Dominika Cibulkova continued her late 2014 revival on Wednesday, outplaying Carla Suárez Navarro to improve to 2-0 at the Garanti Koza WTA Tournament Of Champions in Sofia. The No.2-seeded Cibulkova came out like a house on fire, storming out to a 5-0 lead and, after missing out on her first five set points and letting that lead evaporate, eventually closing the set out, 7-5. The second set was tight too but she got the better of the No.5-seeded Suárez Navarro, 7-5, 6-4. "Until 5-0 I played really, really well, and then it can happen in tennis - maybe I wanted to finish the set too much," Cibulkova said after the match. "When it was 5-3 or 5-4 I still had a few set points, and then when I didn't make them I started to panic a little bit. But I still stayed strong and won the set." Cibulkova seems to be rekindling her early-season magic again. In the first four months of the season she went 24-9, making her first Grand Slam final in Australia and breaking the Top 10 for the first time. But from the start of the clay court season to the end of the regular season she was just 7-14, dropping her opening match at 10 of 14 tournaments - that is until this week in Sofia, where she's 2-0 now.
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