Tag Archives: WTA 250

Caroline Garcia Defeats Maria Sakkari to Advance to Her First WTA Finals Championship Match

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Caroline Garcia is one win away from the biggest title of her career…

The 29-year-old part-Spanish French tennis player, who reached the WTA Finals semifinals five years ago, has taken it to the next level.

Caroline Garcia,Garcia defeated in-form Maria Sakkari, 6-3, 6-2, on Sunday to reach the biggest final of her career against Aryna Sabalenka.

“I’m five years older and maybe five years wiser,” she quipped on court after the match. “You try to learn from everything. We got some tough experiences the last couple years, but I’ve got a big team behind me and supporting me, staying positive even when I was negative about myself. It’s definitely a great year. A lot of things happened that I didn’t think would happen!”

The former world No. 4 dealt with years of injuries and inconsistencies following her 2017 peak, but made a steady-to-meteoric rise in 2022. She won three titles to return to the world’s Top 8 and at last fulfill her presaged potential with a 75-minute win on the WTA Finals Stadium Court, striking 21 winners and six aces.

As an unheralded teenager, she famously earned a ringing endorsement from Andy Murray as he watched Garcia nearly stun Maria Sharapova at the 2011 French Open, and as she has unconsciously spent her career striving to meet Murray’s lofty prediction, the tennis world has long swung from earnest to derisive in its repetition of that sporting myth.

Garcia never looked farther from that goal post at the start of this season when she took an extended absence to heal niggling injuries, but she emerged a fresh, hyper-aggressive athlete who took the racquet out of opponents’ hands. The dividends were small at first, earning her a pair of WTA 250 titles in the summer, but it all came together just before the US Open—ironically when she last played Sakkari.

Garcia was ranked No. 79 in May; she is tentatively set to end the season at her career-high of No. 4.

Garcia has typically met her Greek rival under auspicious circumstances; in their two previous meetings, the Frenchwoman has gone on to win the tournament—most recently at the Western & Southern Open, where she won her first WTA 1000 title since 2017.

The Cincy surge brought Garcia’s 2022 to another level, setting the stage for a first Grand Slam semifinal at the US Open, and though the fall initially brought more mixed fortunes, she was able to peak again for her first WTA Finals appearance in five years. Garcia shook off a shock split with Perret to win two of her three round-robin matches, including a three-set epic against No. 8 seed Daria Kasatkina to confirm her berth in the semifinals, and showed no signs of fatigue from the onset against Sakkari, breaking first in the opening set.

“Yesterday, I was obviously a little bit tired, but nothing unusual after such a big match,” she said. “This morning, the legs were a little big heavy but I was just so excited about the emotions and the win of yesterday, and just to be playing a semifinal of the WTA Finals. I was just so excited and feeling very pumped. I spoke to my physio and said, ‘I just hope I last long enough to get to the match!'”

Sakkari had been even more impressive in her second straight WTA Finals appearance, even if it took until the last week of the season to book her ticket to Fort Worth. The two-time Grand Slam semifinalist won all three of her round-robin matches in straight sets, inspired by the slow Dickies Arena court to employ her most aggressive style.

But in a battle of aggressive players, Garcia will almost always win; she strikes an intimidating pose on both serve and return, stepping deep into the court for the latter. Though Sakkari briefly got the match back on serve, Sakkari struck back with another break at love and won seven of the next eight games to lead by a set and two breaks.

As Sakkari struggled to get on the board, the nerves that have so often haunted Garcia in big matches threatened to crop up when a double fault pulled up break point. Refusing to abandon her game plan, the 2022 Ace Leader went just as big on the next serve and struck a backhand down the line to move within a game of the final.

No such nerves returned when it came time to serve for the match: she crashed the net to bring up three match points and though Sakkari saved one with a backhand winner, Garcia pressed one last error from the No. 5 seed to earn her spot in the final.

Beatriz Haddad Maia Outlasts Alison Riske in Rothesay Open Final to Claim First WTA Tour Title

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It’s a memorable first for Beatriz Haddad Maia.

The 26-year-old Brazilian tennis player defeated USA’s Alison Riske 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 in the Rothesay Open final to claim her first WTA Tour singles title.

Beatriz Haddad MaiaHaddad Maia, currently ranked at a career-high World No.48, fought back from an early break down in the third set before prevailing after 2 hours and 18 minutes in her first meeting with Riske.

She improves to 1-1 in WTA singles finals, having previously finished as runner-up to Jelena Ostapenko at 2017 Seoul. Riske is now 3-10 in WTA singles finals.

In her Nottingham tournament debut, Haddad Maia battled through the field to collect the first WTA singles title by a Brazilian since Teliana Pereira triumphed at Florianopolis 2015.

Beatriz Haddad MaiaHaddad Maia had already been posting strong results in recent weeks. She won her first WTA 125 title in Saint-Malo in May, then followed that up with a run to the WTA 125 Paris final the following week, helping her hit a new peak in the rankings.

Simply by making the Nottingham final, Haddad Maia became the first Brazilian woman to reach a grass-court singles final since Maria Bueno finished runner-up to Margaret Court at Chestnut Hill in 1968.

Earlier in the week, Haddad Maia had knocked top seed Maria Sakkari out in the quarterfinals, which was the left-hander’s fifth consecutive win in her last five meetings against Top 5 players.

Haddad Maia claimed the only break of the first set to lead 2-1, and she took the one-set lead with her second ace of the day. But the second set was all Riske, as the American charged to a 5-0 lead, then came back from 0-40 down to tie up the final.

In the third set, errors by Haddad Maia gave Riske an early break at 2-1, but heavy hitting by the Brazilian allowed her to immediately get back on serve. At 4-3, a terrific passing winner on the sideline gave Haddad Maia double break point, and she claimed that game after a double fault by Riske.

Serving for the championship at 5-3, Haddad Maia coolly wrapped up the match, drawing two return miscues in a row from Riske to complete the last game and grab the crown.

Haddad Maia’s run puts her in a strong position to be seeded at Wimbledon, as she’s projected to rise to a career-best No. 32.

Leylah Fernandez Outlasts Camila Osorio to Claim Second Straight Monterrey Open Title

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Leylah Fernandez is a repeat defender…

The 19-year-old half-Ecuadorian Canadian tennis player outlasted Colombia’s Camila Osorio in an absolutely thrilling final at the Monterrey Open on Sunday night, 6-7 (5), 6-4, 7-6 (3), to win the WTA 250 hard-court event for the second year in a row.

Leylah FernandezFernandez has to fight off five match points late in the third set to win the tournament.

Fernandez has now won her last 10 matches in a row in Monterrey, 17 of her last 20 matches in Mexico and 19 of her last 24 matches in North America.

There were all kinds of momentum swings throughout the two-hour, 52-minute battle, including right from the get-go, as Fernandez stormed out to a 3-0 lead after just eight minutes on court, eventually extending that to 5-2—but an increasingly determined Osorio clawed back to take the opening set in a tie-break.

Fernandez got back on track in the second set, building a 4-1, double-break lead. Osorio began building another comeback, getting one break back, but Fernandez held onto the other one and ended up serving it out to take it to a decider.

After Fernandez broke in the first game of the third set, Osorio won four games in a row to build a 4-1 lead, then Fernandez came back to 4-all, and that’s when the tension reached its peak—Fernandez staved off five match points, one serving to stay in the match at 4-5 and another four serving to stay in the match at 5-6, the last one coming after a 15-minute-plus delay after several lights in the stadium went out.

But once the lights came back on Fernandez came alive one last time, winning 10 of the last 13 points to close it out, ripping a flurry of forehand winners along the way.

At the end of the day, Fernandez’s numbers were just a bit tidier than Osorio’s—she finished with 15 more winners, 44 to 29, to only 9 more unforced errors, 60 to 51.

Fernandez won her second WTA Tour title, having also won Monterrey last year. She’s the third woman in the 14-year history of the event to win it in back-to-back years, after Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (2010-2011) and Garbine Muguruza (2018-2019).

She had also come back from the brink of defeat in the second round earlier in the week—she was two points away from losing serving to stay in the match at 5-6 in the third set against China’s Zheng Qinwen before winning that one, 6-1, 4-6, 7-6 (3).

Despite the narrow loss in the final, it was a great week for the 20-year-old Osorio, who reached her third WTA final—her first two came last year, winning Bogota and finishing runner-up in Tenerife. She also got the second-biggest win of her career along the way, beating No. 15-ranked Elina Svitolina in the quarterfinals—her biggest win also came against Svitolina, when the Ukrainian was No. 6 in Tenerife last year.

The 20-year-old Colombian now rises from No. 44—which was already her career-high—to a new career-high of No. 35 on the new WTA rankings.

On this day a year ago, she was ranked No. 185.