Taiwan’s Wu Fang-hsien and Chinese partner Jiang Xinyu were denied a third doubles title this year after they were narrowly defeated by Italian third seeds Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini at the Qatar Open in Wu’s first WTA 1000 final.
Wu and Jiang had been seeking another title to add to last month’s ASB Classic and Hobart International victories, and appeared to be on track in the first set, leading the Italians 5-3. However, doubles world No. 10 Errani and world No. 11 Paolini staged a comeback to take the set 5-7.
The Taiwanese-Chinese pair again lost a 2-0 lead to be edged 7-6 (7/10) in the second set.
Photo: Liang Wei-ming, Taipei Times
Wu and Jiang saved 11 of 17 break points and converted five of nine break points in the 1 hour, 50 minute match.
“It was a really tough match ... they are playing amazing,” the WTA Web site quoted Paolini as saying of Wu and Jiang in a post-match interview.
Although Wu failed to pick up her first WTA 1000 title, her doubles ranking is set to rise to a high of world No. 31.
Photo: Reuters
She and her partner also earned a wild card spot in the Dubai Tennis Championships, another WTA 1000 event, where Australian Open runners-up and third seeds Hsieh Su-wei of Taiwan and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia have already earned a bye to the round-of-16.
Wu and Jiang defeated Hsieh and Ostapenko last week to advance to the quarter-finals in Doha.
In Dubai, Hsieh and Jiang are today to play China’s Xu Yifan and Yang Zhouxuan.
Yesterday, sixth seeds Chan Hao-ching and Veronika Kudermetova of Russia were knocked out in the opening round with a 6-4, 6-2 loss to Tereza Mihalikova of Slovakia and Olivia Nicholls of the UK.
Meanwhile, in the women’s singles final in Doha, Amanda Anisimova claimed her first WTA 1000 title when she beat Ostapenko 6-4, 6-3, which would see the American break into the top 20 for the first time in her career.
Ranked 41 in the world, Anisimova also became the lowest-ranked player to win the tournament as she beat six top-40 opponents en route to her third singles title.
The American was ranked as low as world No. 359 in 2023 when she took a break from the game due to burnout as it took a toll on her mental health, but the 23-year-old has been on the rise since her comeback and is set to move up to 18th in the rankings.
Anisimova is only the second American to win the title, following in the footsteps of Monica Seles in 2002, while Ostapenko has now finished runner-up in Doha for a second time having also lost in the 2016 final.
“There’s been a lot of hard work, a lot of tears and a lot of good moments,” Anisimova said. “With tennis you kind of experience it all, but that’s also why I love it. There have been a lot of challenges the last few weeks. I’m very proud of myself and happy with how I’ve dealt with them.”
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