Simona Halep falls in the last hurdle of Cincinnati after she had a couple of fantastic and tough weeks.
After winning a complicated title in Montreal, the world no.1 managed to get to the final in Cincinnati to face an in-form Kiki Bertens, but this time the Romanian didn’t find the solution.
The match
After winning the first set 6-2, the Romanian appeared to be in full control of the situation.
However, Kiki found her way back to surprise Simona with a 4-1 lead. When Halep made it even it looked almost obvious that the world no.1 was well on her way to grab her back to back title. Indeed, Simona was 1 point away from that as she had a championship point when leading 6-5 in the following breaker, but it was Bertens to win 3 consecutive points to bring the affair at the decider.
In the third set, Simona looked spent after 2 grueling weeks, and after conquering a strong 5-1 lead, Kiki won the all things. The final score was 2-6 7-6 (6) 6-2
.I was feeling better in the 2nd and 3rd set. BERTENS
Soon after the match, Kiki commented
“In the beginning, I knew that I had to play aggressive, but I was a little bit doubting sometimes, like where should I hit, because she such a great mover also on the court. I think in the second set I had that feeling a little bit more, like, where I could attack her serve or where I could play a little bit more forward coming to the net. The second and the third I was more feeling that.”
This is Kiki’s 6th career title, the 2nd of this season after Charleston.
6TH CAREER TITLE |
Embed from Getty Images |