In a thrilling see-saw match at the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati that finished in the early evening hours on Sunday, world No. 7 Maria Sharapova rallied from 6-4, 2-0 down against No. 13 seed and 2009 champion Jelena Jankovic for a 4-6, 7-6(3), 6-3 victory in two hours and 49 minutes. The win marked Sharapova’s 24th career WTA Tour title, which includes three Grand Slam singles crowns. Last year in Cincinnati, the Russian fell to Kim Clijsters in the championship match.
“I was so close last year, so it’s nice to have that feeling of being the champion after going through a tough one last year,” said Sharapova. “It wasn’t really something I thought about coming in this week. I just knew that I played some good tennis here last year, and I hope that I could take it a step further.”
Sharapova, who earned a $360,000 champions pay check and 900 ranking points, rallied from a break down on three different occasions in the final set before eventually taking control to go up 5-3 and serve out the match.
The Russian, who will be ranked No. 4 in Monday’s newly released WTA Tour Rankings, served two aces in each set, hit a total of 11 double faults throughout the match, but won an impressive 70 percent of first serve points. Jankovic, who earned $180,000 and 620 ranking points for her runner-up performance, blamed the wind for her nine doubles faults and only 61 percent first serve points won throughout the contest.
“Sometimes I would toss (the ball) and it would go too far in front or somewhere it’s not my hitting zone,” said Jankovic, who is a former top-ranked player. “But I don’t want to make excuses. Just it wasn’t my serving day. Today, unfortunately, you know, it wasn’t there. I wish it was, because it would be, you know, a big difference.
Sharapova, who will now enter the US Open in one week as one of the heavy favorites, becomes the fifth Russian to win the Cincinnati title. She improves to 11-0 this season in three sets matches with her win today over the Serbian sensation.
In the men’s championship match, a rematch of the 2008 final, that just didn’t seem to live up to the hype, world No. 1 Novak Djokovic’s astonishing winning streak came to an abrupt end at 16-matches when he retired with a right shoulder injury down 6-4, 3-0 against world No. 4 Andy Murray. It was just the second time in Cincinnati tournament history that a men’s singles title match ended in retirement and first since 1952 when Noel Brown defeated Fred Hagist 6-4, 0-6, 2-0 ret.
The Scot broke to open the match before being broken back in the sixth game. Murray would immediately break back before winning six of the next seven games prior to Djokovic’s announcement that he would be retiring from the match.
“It was a really good week after I struggled last week. I didn’t drop a set and beat some very good players from pretty much the first round onwards,” said Murray. “Against Nalbandian who I started off against it was tough, and then Mardy was playing really good tennis going into the semis.”
Djokovic, who falls to 57-2 on the season with the loss, said his shoulder had been bothering him for the last 10 days or so but decided to play through the pain.
“I just could not serve,” said Djokovic. “I served an average 90 miles per hour the first serve, and I could not play forehands. You know, I could have maybe played another couple of games, but what for? I cannot beat a player like Murray today with one stroke.”
Despite the loss, Djokovic is still the most dominating player on the ATP World Tour and the serious favorite to win the US Open title in New York.
“I am confident that I can recover and be ready for US Open,” said Djokovic.
In the men’s doubles finals that was played on the Grandstand Court, No. 3 seeds Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes defeated No. 4 seeds Michael Llodra and Nenad Zimonjic 7-6(4), 7-6(2) to give the Indian Express their first ATP World Tour Masters 1000 title in Cincinnati in 10 years.
“If you had asked me 10 years ago if we would win here again 10 years later, I would have started laughing that we’d still be playing,” said Paes. “It’s a great feeling to come back and win in the summer. We didn’t have so much rhythm in Europe, but we managed to put it together this week. We’ve beat some really big teams and are playing well. For us, it’s a big confidence booster for the US Open, but we still have a lot of work to do there.”
No. 3 seeds Vania King and Yaroslava Shvedova defeated unseeded Natalie Grandin and Vladimira Uhlirova 6-4, 3-6, 11-9 in just under two hours. King and Shvedova, who won Wimbledon and the US Open last year, were just two points from defeat in the super-tiebreak.
“It was a weird first set – we were very up and down, and then we had the rain delay and it was still up and down,” said King. “I thought they played more solid today but we were able to win it in the end. Anything can happen in a super-tiebreak – a mis-hit here or there and losing a point on your serve, and you can be down four or five points. We’re happy we managed to close it out.”
King has now won five WTA doubles titles with Shvedova, including 13 overall in her career. Grandin and Uhlirova were playing in their fifth WTA doubles final and will now fall to 0-5 in championship matches together.
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