Aryna Sabalenka has a fantastic start of the new season after winning her 3rd career title in her first tournament of the year in Shenzhen.
How Aryna won the tournament
Sabalenka had a bit of a tricky ride at the very end as she needed to win the semifinal and the final in the same day (Saturday) to win this title.
In the semifinal, Sabalenka defeated Yafan Yang 6-2 6-1 in 62 minutes. This was an important result for Aryna that with this quick win she had still energies for the subsequent final against Alison Riske.
The match against the American was much more complicated. Alison grabbed immediately an early break in the 3rd game (2-1) that was enough for her to win the first set 6-4.
Sabalenka had a fantastic start of the 2nd set after she got a strong 4-1 lead with Riske often struggling to hold her serve. Eventually, it was Aryna to being broken unexpectedly at love while she was serving for the set and everything went to the breaker that Sabalenka won at 2.
The Belarussian was in firm command of the decider to immediately lead 3-0 (2 breaks up). After an exchange of breaks, Sabalenka won the match 4-6 7-6 (2) 6-3 after 2 hours and 9 minutes.
3RD CAREER TITLE!
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