Radwanska is Dubai champ

Agnieszka Radwanska won her eighth Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) singles title with a straight-sets victory over Germany’s Julia Goerges in the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships final on Saturday night. The 22-year-old Pole prevailed 7-5, 6-4, in one hour and 44 minutes to take her win-loss record this year to 15-3 and move up to a career-high fifth in the WTA singles rankings. The triumphant fifth seed here has still only been beaten in 2012 by the world number one, Victoria Azarenka. Radwanska got off to a brisk start – breaking Goerges in the very first game – and held that advantage through to the eighth, when her Bad Oldesloe-born opponent broke back and held serve to lead at 5-4. Radwanska won seven of the following eight games though, including three service breaks, to take the first set 7-5 and edge 4-1 in the second. Goerges broke back instantaneously, but both players then held two service games apiece for Radwanska to succeed the dethroned Caroline Wozniacki as the tournament’s reigning queen. ‘I came pretty close to losing in the first round (against Canadian qualifier Aleksandra Wozniak 6-1, 6-7 (6), 7-5), so I’m just extremely happy,’ Radwanska said. ‘I was just better on a couple of points. They were two tight sets and it was pretty close, but – in the important moments – I was more consistent. ‘It was tough, for sure, particularly as the conditions were a little bit difficult; it was windy. ‘But, I’m just so happy that I stayed calm until the end and focused on my game.’ Earlier in the evening, the highly-experienced American duo Liezel Huber and Lisa Raymond easily overcame Sania Mirza, of India, and Russia’s Elena Vesnina in the women’s doubles final 6-2, 6-1. With Raymond starting off proceedings, the initial five games went with serve until Vesnina was broken at receivers’ choice in the sixth. That game would be the first of nine the first seeded pairing of Huber and Raymond would win from 10 overall as they emphatically stormed their way to the title. Huber consolidated the break immediately thereafter for 5-2 and Mirza was subsequently broken on receivers’ choice to wrap up the first set at 6-2; Mirza faulting on four of the seven points as Huber and Raymond once again fought back from 30-0 down to claim another game from their second-ranked opponents. More of the same occurred in the second set too, with Huber and Raymond breaking Vesnina’s serve in the second game, Mirza’s in the fourth and Vesnina’s again in the sixth. For their part, Raymond held her serve in the first and fifth games, with Huber doing likewise in the seventh and sealing outright victory fittingly with an ace after being broken in the third. ‘It feels great,’ enthused Raymond. ‘When we step on the court now, we feel like the teams are going to have to really come up with something and produce really good tennis to beat us. ‘We proved that. That is a team we’ve lost a lot to and we went out there with a game plan and decisively won the match.’