Sara Errani breezed aside Barbora Strykova 6-0 6-2 after 66 minutes in the final of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Tournament to clinch her ninth career title in 19 finals and the first at Premier level. The Italian played her second Dubai final three years after the defeat against Petra Kvitova.
Errani had a dream week in which she reached her fifth final at Premier level after beating Yaroslava Schvedova, Madison Brengle (after coming back from 1-4 in the third set) and Elina Svitolina in the semifinal. Strykova reached her first Premier-level final after beating Julia Georges, Ana Ivanovic and Caroline Garcia. Errani led 5-1 in her previous head-to-head matches against Strykova but they tied 1-1 in their hard-court matches (Strykova won in Stuttgart 2008 and Errani beat her Czech rival in Tokyo 2010).
Errani got off to a flying start in the first set, getting a break to love in the opening game. Errani got a double break in the third game to breeze to 4-0 in just 15 minutes. Both players exchanged a 26-shot rally (the longest rally of the match) featuring a slice backhand duel which ended with Strykova hitting a drop-shot into the net. Errani broke for the third straight time for 5-0 as Strykova hit a forehand into the net. Strykova saved three set points as Errani was serving for the first set. Errani converted her fourth set point to close out the first set in just 29 minutes. Errani dropped just five points on her first serve.
In the second set Errani got her fourth consecutive break in the first game as Strykova hit her first double fault. Strykova got her first game on the scoreboard for 1-2 in the third game, but Errani clinched her double break in the fifth game to love to pull away to 4-1.
Errani earned the first championship point at 5-1 but Strykova saved it with her backhand volley. Strykova saved four match points before Errani served out for the match on her fifth opportunity in the seventh game. Errani clinched the second WTA title of 2016 for Italian tennis, one week after Roberta Vinci’s win in St. Petersburg against Belinda Bencic.
The error-stricken Strykova produced 15 winners to 43 unforced errors compared to Errani’s eight and 11. The Italian star dropped just one set in five matches to become the first Italian winner win in the Dubai tournament.
Errani had played her previous final in Bucharest last year when she lost to Ana Karolina Schmiedlova. She has won her first final since February 2015 when she beat Schmiedlova. After today’s final the Italian player has a win-loss record of 9-10 in her 19 finals and will move up to world number 17 next week.
“I am happy for me, my family and my team. I tried to be focused on every point. I tried not to think too much about what was happening. At the end I was very nervous. It’s really incredible to be here. I am sorry for Barbora. She is an amazing player. Maybe it was not her day. It’s tough to win those last points. I had a match point at 5-1 and then I closed it on the fifth match point. There were a lot of nerves“. said Errani.
