American Sloane Stephens won her third WTA title of the year on Sunday, beating resurgent Russian Elena Vesnina 7-6 (7/4), 6-2 in Charleston, South Carolina.
The seventh-seeded Stephens rallied from an early break to take a 5-2 lead in the first set, only for Vesnina to win four games in a row and give herself a set point with a welter of winners.
Stephens kept her cool, won the set in a tiebreaker and powered through the second.
Photo: AP
She broke Vesnina twice more and clinched the victory on her fourth match point.
Stephens, who lifted the trophies in Auckland, New Zealand, and Acapulco, Mexico, this year, said she is hoping Sunday’s triumph is a stepping stone to a strong season on the red clay of Europe.
“I love red clay, so starting in Madrid, I think I will have a lot of fun and just look forward to the French Open,” Stephens said.
Vesnina, a former world No. 21, who reached the Charleston final in 2011, reached the title match this year as a qualifier.
She toppled second-seeded Swiss Belinda Bencic in the second round and is projected to rise from 85th into the top 55 of the world rankings.
KATOWICE OPEN
AFP, KATOWICE, Poland
Slovakia’s Dominika Cibulkova won her first title since 2014 when she swept past Italy’s Camila Giorgi, 6-4, 6-0 in the Katowice WTA final on Sunday.
Eighth-seeded Cibulkova, the 2014 Australian Open runner-up, captured the last seven games of the match against her fifth-seeded opponent, who was playing in her third final at the Polish venue.
A former world No. 10, Cibulkova saw her ranking fall to 62 last year when she missed five months of the season after undergoing Achilles surgery.
However, her win on Sunday — a fifth career title — is to put her back into the top 40 and in with a chance of being seeded for the French Open.
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