Radwanska claims China Open title
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Xinhua, October 10, 2011
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| Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska holds her trophy after defeating Germany's Andrea Petkovic in the women's singles final of the China Open Tennis Tournament at the national stadium court in Beijing, Sunday, Oct. 9, 2011. |
Agnieszka Radwanska from Poland experienced a 154-minute battle to disarm German world No. 11 Andrea Petkovic 7-5, 0-6, 6-4 to seal the title of China Open in Beijing on Sunday.
The victory awarded the Pole the 11th straight WTA match and second title in a row. It was also the biggest victory ever for Radwanska.
At the awarding ceremony, Radwanska and Petkovic performed a short Chinese dance as was promised after yesterday's semis. Petkovic, who was plagued by injury all through the match, burst into tears and buried her face into the towel after the dance.
"She did a great job today. I was scared when I got hurt during the match, but the doctor said it's no problem," said Petkovic. "She deserved the title."
Radwanska fired four aces through the match, while her opponent only got one. Neither player was efficient in holding their serves, Radwanska lost eight of them, and Petkovic dropped six.
Radwanska entered the match with a break and established a 4-1 lead after breaking her opponent for a second time in the first set.
However, Petkovic refused to surrender, breaking back to pull the score to 3-4. Petkovic got hurt in muscle in the eighth game, and she called a medical timeout. She then came back to the court with another break to level the score to 4-4. After the score got to 5-5, Radwanska knocked down two straight games to wrap up the first set 7-5.
Petkovic wasn't exhausted by the 84-minute first set. She made use of the mistakes from the other side of the court, keeping Radwanska at love to move into the final set.
Breaking became the theme of the third set. Radwanska succeed three times, while Petkovic broke twice. Petkovic made a fatal forehand error to lose the ninth set to her rival, and Radwanska held serve to harvest the victory 6-4.
