Top seed Elena Rybakina powered to a 6-1 6-4 win over Russian Daria Kasatkina within the ultimate of the Abu Dhabi Open on Sunday to raise her second trophy of the season and seventh total.
The 2022 Wimbledon champion started the competition on Stadium Court in sometimes dominant trend to seize an early break, however seventh seed Kasatkina struck again with certainly one of her personal solely to fall behind once more in blustery circumstances.
Rybakina regained composure to go 5-1 up on the again of massive serving as Kasatkina struggled for consistency and the 24-year-old Brisbane champion wrapped up the opening set in 25 minutes when her opponent despatched a forehand huge.
The pair had come into the competition having break up their 4 conferences – all on hardcourts – and Adelaide runner-up Kasatkina confirmed loads of combat to pull two breaks again within the subsequent set with relentless baseline hitting and gorgeous winners.
Level at 4-4, Rybakina turned the warmth up to break the 26-year-old Kasatkina with a crosscourt scorcher and the Moscow-born Kazakh returned after a quick rain delay to safe the victory on serve.
Both gamers will now head to Doha for the Qatar Open, with Kasatkina set to face Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in her opener on Monday whereas Rybakina has a bye into the second spherical.
“A tough week, especially the last matches, and tomorrow is already a match in Doha (for Kasatkina),” Rybakina stated.
“Hopefully we both recover and do well there and maybe play final there.
“I would like to thank all of the followers who got here to assist us. It’s been an incredible ambiance and particularly to see the flags from Kazakhstan it actually means quite a bit.”
Kasatkina, who came through a gruelling semi-final against Beatriz Haddad Maia on Saturday that lasted nearly three hours, was disappointed with the loss but remained upbeat about her form early in the season.
“Did I’ve sufficient within the tank for the ultimate? I squeezed all the pieces that I had left and it wasn’t sufficient towards a participant like Elena … you may have to be at your finest to have an opportunity to beat her,” Kasatkina said.
“Unfortunate that the match ended this manner however there’s quite a lot of positives within the week. There’s nothing to be unhappy about however after all it is at all times disappointing to lose in a ultimate.”