Victoria Azarenka ended Li Na’s unbeaten two-year run at the Sydney International with a fighting three-set victory in the final yesterday.
The Belarussian third seed claimed her ninth career WTA title with a 6-2, 1-6, 6-3 victory over the fourth-seeded Chinese star in 1 hour, 56 minutes on Ken Rosewall Arena.
French Open champion Li was on a nine-match winning run in Sydney after beating Kim Clijsters in last year’s final, but was edged out by Azarenka, who ranks third in the world behind Caroline Wozniacki and Petra Kvitova.
Photo: AFP
It capped a big week for 22-year-old Azarenka, with victories over Jelena Jankovic, Marion Bartoli, Agnieszka Radwanska and Li ahead of Monday’s Australian Open in Melbourne.
Despite her victory, Azarenka will remain at world No. 3, while Li is expected to drop one place to sixth behind Australian Samantha Stosur when the next rankings are released on Monday.
Azarenka is among six players with a chance of reaching the top spot depending on results at the year’s opening Grand Slam tournament in Melbourne.
Photo: EPA
In three trips to Australia, Li has compiled a 21-4 record, highlighted by a semi-final appearance at the 2010 Australian Open, her runner-up finish to Clijsters at last year’s Open, her Sydney win last year and the run to this week’s final.
Li heads to Melbourne in form after a dip in the second half of last year following her landmark French Open success, which saw her become the first Asian to win a Grand Slam title.
Li, who only won seven matches in the second half of last year, said she was back in the form she had enjoyed prior to Wimbledon, where she bowed out to Germany’s Sabine Lisicki in the second round.
Photo: AFP
Azarenka broke Li’s service three times to storm through the opening set of yesterday’s final in 34 minutes, but encountered greater resistance in the second set, when Li called her coach and husband Jiang Shan to the court and her play tightened up significantly.
She broke Azarenka’s serve twice in the fourth and sixth games and leveled the match when the Belarussian pushed a backhand wide.
Both players shared service breaks at the start of the final set, but when Li’s serve was broken in the eighth game, Azarenka served out for the championship, winning on her second match point.
In the men’s singles, Journeymen Jarkko Nieminen and Julien Benneteau earned themselves a rare ATP title shot after beating higher-ranked semi-final opponents yesterday.
Finland’s Nieminen, 30, needed a marathon 26-point tiebreaker before prevailing over Uzbekistan’s 67th-ranked Denis Istomin 7-6 (14/12), 6-3 in 1 hour, 44 minutes to reach his 12th career ATP final today.
French world No. 49 Benneteau required six match points and had to win through a see-sawing 14-minute final game before seeing off Cypriot Marcos Baghdatis 6-4, 6-4 in almost two hours.
Left-hander Nieminen, ranked 77, has only won one title — in Auckland six years ago — and was a beaten Sydney finalist in 2009 against David Nalbandian.
He is bidding to become the first qualifier to win the tournament since South Korea’s Lee Hyung-taik claimed the title nine years ago.
“I really enjoyed that moment being in the finals again now a second time here,” Nieminen said. “It’s just great that I start the year like this. I struggled in the beginning of the last year, and this is a real great confidence boost for me.”
Benneteau, 30, a semi-finalist here two years ago, will be playing in his sixth final and has yet to win a title.
The Frenchman, who improved his record against Baghdatis to 4-2, has yet to drop a set this week after wins over Andreas Seppi, fourth seed Feliciano Lopez and Alex Bogomolov Jr.
“I’ve never beat him [Nieminen] on the tour. Each time, it was very tough matches, very tight, three sets, long matches,” Benneteau said. “He’s a good player. He has some confidence because he’s won a lot matches this week, but also he can be a little bit tired. Now it depends on me, how I can manage to find a way to win the first title of my career.”
Former Sydney winner Baghdatis was disappointed with his performance a few days ahead of the Australian Open, where he was a beaten finalist against Roger Federer six years ago.
“I was a bit tight again. I wasn’t so aggressive. I tried, but my shots were not heavy enough,” 43-ranked Baghdatis said. “He played very smart, very aggressive and was serving very well. I had my chances. I didn’t take them, he did. Basically, that’s it.”
HOBART INTERNATIONAL
AP, HOBART, AUSTRALIA
Top-seeded Yanina Wickmayer moved into the Hobart International final with a 7-6 (7/1), 6-3 win over sixth-seeded Shahar Peer of Israel yesterday.
Wickmayer will play 21-year-old German qualifier Mona Barthel, who has beaten the players seeded second, fourth and fifth en route to her first WTA Tour final in the Australian Open tuneup event.
Barthel advanced to the final of the Hobart International with a 6-0, 7-6 (8/6) win earlier yesterday over fourth-seeded compatriot Angelique Kerber.
Kerber served for the second set at 5-4, but could not convert two set points and Barthel won the crucial game, chasing down a drop-shot and hitting a return passing-shot for a winner. Barthel came back from 3-0 down in the tiebreaker.
The 21-year-old Barthel, who is at a career-high ranking of 64, has already beaten second-seeded Anabel Medina Garrigues and fifth-seeded Jarmila Gajdosova of Australia on the way to the final.
KOOYONG CLASSIC
AFP, MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA
Mardy Fish kept his focus after a rain interruption yesterday to complete a 6-2, 4-6, 6-1 win over Austria’s Jurgen Melzer, propelling the American into the final of the Kooyong Classic. The 30-year-old Fish, ranked eighth in the world, will face promising Australian teen Bernard Tomic in today’s final of the elite eight-man tune-up for the Australian Open, which starts on Monday.
Conditions at the Kooyong club were challenging for a third straight day, with light rain stopping play in the second set with Fish up a break and 2-2, 15-all in the second. After a 45-minute interruption, Melzer returned to court the stronger of the pair, leveling the match after breaking Fish to love for 5-4. However, the third set swung back to Fish, with the American re-establishing dominance to book a spot in the final after less than 90 minutes of play.
“I played well, with maybe one bad game,” Fish said.
“You have to get used to rain delays again and it’s been a while since I dealt with one, I could have shown some more energy when we came back out,” he added.
Today, he will attempt to follow in the footsteps of his friend Andy Roddick, who won the Open warm-up tournament three times.
Fish is hoping to build on the breakthrough he made last year when he moved into the ATP top 10 after losing weight and rebuilding his game following knee surgery in 2009. The American said playing a competitive match made all the difference in preparation for the Open.
“No matter how many practice matches you play at Melbourne Park, you can’t duplicate this: a crowd, television, the pressure. This is great preparation for the Open,” he said.
Fish has a 2-1 record against the 19-year-old Tomic, who is ranked 37th and lost their last meeting in October in the second round in Shanghai.
“He has a great feel for the game, he’s got all the shots and he’s awkward to play. He’ll only get more confident and tougher to play.” Fish said. “He’s light-years ahead of where I was at 19, so I can’t compare myself to him.”
HEINEKEN OPEN
AFP, AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND
Top-seed David Ferrer beat Fernando Verdasco 6-3, 6-4 in the semi-finals of the ATP’ Heineken Open in Auckland yesterday to cap a grueling day on court and book a final showdown with Olivier Rochus.
The unseeded Rochus, a finalist seven years ago, came from behind to upset Germany’s Philipp Kohlschreiber 6-7 (4/7), 6-1, 6-4 in the other semi-final.
It was a long day of tennis in blustery conditions for Ferrer and Verdasco, who were forced to play two matches after their quarter-finals against Alejandro Falla and Guillermo Garcia-Lopez were washed out on Thursday night.
World No. 5 Ferrer began the day with a marathon match against Falla, prevailing 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 in more than two hours, while Verdasco was on court for just as long beating doubles partner Garcia--Lopez 7-5, 6-4.
Four hours later, Ferrer and Verdasco were back for their all-Spanish semi-final where Ferrer made light of the quick turnaround as he raced through the match in 90 minutes and without dropping his serve.
The defending Auckland titleholder broke Verdasco early and never looked back, serving a love game to take the first set and setting up the victory with a second service break midway through the second set.
Rochus knocked out the tournament eighth seed Kohlschreiber after losing the first set in a tiebreak and then stepping up a gear to race through the second set 6-1.
The deciding third set reached 4-4, before Kohlschreiber dropped his serve allowing the Belgian to serve for the match.
“It is fantastic to be in the final,” world No. 68 Rochus said. “I am almost 31, so I’ve had a long time on the tour, but I’m still playing to have moments like this today.”
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