China’s Li Na upset two-time champion Kim Clijsters to win the Sydney International title and her fourth career WTA crown yesterday.
Eighth seed Li recovered from going behind 0-5 in the opening set to rally for a convincing 7-6 (7/3), 6-3 victory in an hour and 30 minutes.
It was her second WTA title in Australia after winning the Gold Coast event in 2008 and last year, she was a surprise semi-finalist at the Australian Open.
PHOTO: AFP
Li, 28, will stay at her 11th ranking despite the win, while Clijsters missed the chance to move up from No. 3 to No. 2 in the rankings ahead of Russian Vera Zvonareva.
It was Li’s second victory in six encounters with US Open champion Clijsters and her first win over the Belgian in three matches at the Sydney tournament.
Clijsters, 27, who won in Sydney in 2003 and 2007, had been a perfect 13-0 in semi-final and final matches since her return to tennis in August 2009 as Li pulled off the boilover.
PHOTO: REUTERS
It capped a magnificent week for Li after she eliminated two-time major champion Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia in the quarter-finals, Serbian Bojana Jovanovski in the semis and Australian Anastasia Rodionova and French qualifier Virginie Razzano in the earlier rounds.
Li became the first Chinese player to break into the world top 10 rankings after reaching the last four at last year’s Australian Open.
Clijsters raced to a 5-0 lead after two service breaks, but as quick as that took, Li hit back stringing together the next six games.
The Belgian mother again broke out to a 3-1 lead in the tiebreak, but Li reeled her in when Clijsters’ forehand gave up four errors to hand the opening set to the Chinese star in 48 minutes.
Clijsters’ normally reliable forehand was going off and she served three double-faults in the ninth game to signal a change in momentum.
A sign of her mounting frustration, Clijsters angrily slammed a ball into the court after she was broken in the second game of the second set by Li.
Li fought off a break point and held a clutch serve to 5-2 to be only one game away from victory.
Li raced to three match points on serve and took the championship on her second match point.
Earlier yesterday, Gilles Simon’s determination to stick it out earned the Frenchman a place in the men’s final after the capitulation of his opponent Ernests Gulbis in their semi-final.
The 41st-ranked Simon weathered Gulbis’ early firepower in warm conditions before closing out a 7-6 (7/1), 6-0 win in 73 minutes to claim a place in today’s final against Serbia’s fourth seed Viktor Troicki.
Troicki overcame German Florian Mayer, 6-4, 7-6 (7/4) and is bidding for his second career ATP title in the Sydney final.
Latvian third seed Gulbis was broken serving for the opening set and lost the tiebreaker 7-1.
It signaled a rapid decline for Gulbis, who went through the motions in the second set, winning only two points to hand Simon victory and passage into the final.
“The thing is that I know on the court I can play three hours even if it’s 40 °[C] outside,” Simon said. “I know that if the match is difficult, if we have to run, fight on every point, at the end it’s good for me.
Gulbis was unapologetic about his fade-out in the second set.
“It happened similar like the days before, that in the beginning of the match I felt good and then slowly I feel every game worse and worse physically because of the humidity,” Gulbis said.
“When he got an early break [in the second set], then I didn’t have it in me anymore physically and I was done. Okay, I made two or three points. Bad luck. Next time I will make four,” he smiled.
Simon, 26, will be playing for his eighth career ATP title and has yet to drop a set in the tournament after victories over eighth seed Lu Yen-hsun of Taiwan, Portuguese qualifier Frederico Gil and Ukraine’s Alexandr Dolgopolov.
Although he may face Roger Federer in the second round of next week’s Australian Open in Melbourne, Simon said his priority was winning the Sydney International.
“I’m feeling good. I have played four good matches in a row and I haven’t lost any sets ... I know the victory here is for the moment the priority and then I have to play against Lu one more time at the Australian Open,” Simon said.
“We know how tennis works. You can win one week an easy win and then lose the week right after. So for now, I’m just focusing on the final,” he added.
AUCKLAND ATP
AP, AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND
David Ferrer will play David Nalbandian in the final of the Auckland ATP, also known as the Heineken Open, after both won their semi-finals yesterday in straight sets.
Top-seeded Ferrer of Spain beat unseeded Santiago Giraldo of Colombia 6-3, 7-5 to progress to today’s final.
Nalbandian, of Argentina, beat Spaniard Nicolas Almagro 6-4, 6-2.
The second-seeded Almagro, playing with a bandaged right index finger, competed strongly in the first set until he needed a medical time-out to get his right foot attended to by a courtside trainer.
HOBART INTERNATIONAL
AP, HOBART, AUSTRALIA
Bethanie Mattek-Sands of the US will play Jarmila Groth of Australia in the final of the Hobart International after semi-final wins yesterday.
The sixth-seeded Groth beat fifth-seeded Klara Zakapalova of the Czech Republic 6-3, 6-2, while Mattek-Sands defeated Peng Shuai of China 4-6, 6-1, 6-1.
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