Top-ranked Dinara Safina won her first title of the year Saturday by routing fellow Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-3, 6-2 in the final of the Italian Open.
Published on: 9th May, 2009
Top-ranked Dinara Safina won her first title of the year Saturday by routing fellow Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-3, 6-2 in the final of the Italian Open. | Related News
Fourth seed Tomas Berdych will take on Russia’s Mikhail Youzhny in the final of the BMW Open in Munich on Sunday.
Berdych saw off the challenge of Frenchman Jeremy Chardy in three sets to book his place in the final, while Youzhny also needed three to dispose of home wildcard hope Daniel Brands.
Berdych looked on course for a quick-fire victory over Chardy as he raced through the first set for the loss of just one game, dominating his rather shell-shocked opponent.
However, big-serving Chardy rallied and forced four break points on the Berdych delivery in the second set before the Czech player finally cracked in the 12th game allowing the Frenchman to level.
But Berdych responded strongly and went on to break Chardy twice in the deciding set as he eventually closed out a 6-1 5-7 6-2 success in an hour and 45 minutes.
Youzhny was forced to come from a set down in hi semi-final encounter as Brands threatened to pull off yet another shock win.
The 21-year-old, ranked 141st in the world, made a flying start as he consolidated a single break by serving three aces to seal the first set 6-3.
But Youzhny took control of the match in the second with Brands struggling to reproduce his accurate groundstrokes and again a single break proved sufficient as the Russian forced a third set.
It looked likely that Brands would come out on top in the decider as he forced no fewer than six break points on the Youzhny serve, but the Russian maintained his concentration to see off all of them and then struck decisively on Brands’ delivery in the ninth game to move 5-4 up.
He duly served out to clinch a 3-6 6-3 6-4 victory and set up a final showdown with Berdych.
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