MASON, 20 Aug: Top-ranked Jannik Sinner and women\u2019s No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka earned straight-set victories in the finals of the Cincinnati Open on Monday, the first titles at the tournament for both players.
\nSabalenka defeated Jessica Pegula 6-3, 7-5 for her first title since the Australian Open in January.
\nSinner, who turned 23 on Friday, beat American Frances Tiafoe 7-6 (4), 6-2 to become the youngest Cincinnati champion since 21-year-old Andy Murray won in 2008.
\n\u201cI\u2019m very happy to be in the position where I am,\u201d Sinner said. \u201cI\u2019m just trying to keep going this way mentally. It\u2019s important to recover to be ready for New York. That\u2019s the most important thing.\u201d
\nThe U.S. Open begins on Aug. 26 in New York.
\nSinner and Tiafoe were both playing in their first Cincinnati finals with their previous best results being the third round.
\nTiafoe forced a tiebreak in the first set, but three straight errors led to a 7-6 defeat.
\nSinner had a 5-1 lead in the second before Tiafoe saved three match points to make it 5-2 before Sinner was able to serve out for the win.
\nTiafoe had a less conventional path to the final. He won the first set in the quarterfinals on Saturday before Hubert Hurkacz retired with a calf injury then saved two match points to defeat Holger Rune in three sets in the semis.
\nAn American man hasn\u2019t won the title in Cincinnati since Andy Roddick in 2006.
\nSabalenka moved up a spot to No. 2 in the rankings before the match, then didn\u2019t lose a set en route to her 15th WTA title. She had never gotten past the semifinals at Cincinnati, losing three times in that round.
\nThe 26-year-old Sabalenka can now be considered a favorite at the U.S. Open. The Belarusian missed Wimbledon with a shoulder injury, then returned to the tour at Washington two weeks ago.
\n\u201cI would say that I\u2019m really playing great tennis,\u201d Sabalenka said. \u201cProbably not the best tennis I can play but I\u2019m definitely getting there. Hopefully at the U.S. Open I can reach even higher levels.\u201d
\nAgainst Pegula, Sabalenka took 17 minutes to build a 4-1 lead in the first set. Pegula, who double-faulted five times, broke serve for the first time to tie the second set at 5-all, but Sabalenka won the next two games to finish off the 1-hour, 14-minute match.
\n\u201cShe was playing at a high level and never really came down,\u201d Pegula said. \u201cWhen she\u2019s serving really well, it\u2019s tough, especially on these fast courts.\u201d
\nThe sixth-ranked Pegula had a challenging road to the final. After defending her title at Toronto, the American played two matches on Friday because of weather-related postponements and had three matches go three sets. Her time on the court exceeded Sabalenka\u2019s by more than two hours entering the final.
\n\u201cI\u2019m proving to myself that I can play a lot of matches and overcome a lot of challenges,\u201d Pegula said. \u201cI\u2019m looking forward to not doing anything for a few days.\u201d
\nSabalenka joined top-ranked Iga Swiatek as the only players with 10 or more WTA titles since 2020. She beat Swiatek in the Cincinnati semis. (AP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
MASON, 20 Aug: Top-ranked Jannik Sinner and women\u2019s No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka earned straight-set victories in the finals of the Cincinnati Open on Monday, the first titles at the tournament for both players. Sabalenka defeated Jessica Pegula 6-3, 7-5 for her first title since the Australian Open in January. Sinner, who turned 23 on Friday, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-246793","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246793\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}