TENNIS -World Number 1 Serena Williams won her seventh Sony Open title in Miami in seven finals and her 55th WTA Trophy after reeling off six consecutive games from 2-5 in the first set to beat World Number 2 Li Na 7-5 6-1 in a match featuring two 32-year-old players. Diego Sampaolo
Li Na broke serve in the opening game and saved three break points for 2-2 with three winners. The Chinese player got another break to storm to a 5-2 lead with a series of ground strokes in the first set. Serena broke back in the eighth game for 3-5. Serena then saved the set point at 4-5 with a down-the-line backhand winner. She reeled off 10 points to 2 to take a 6-5 lead. Li Na got four chances to force the set to the tie-break but Williams fended them off in a 18-point game. Williams closed out the opening set on the fourth set point after a marathon 12-minute game.
Williams reeled off 11 of her last 12 games to lift her seventh Miami title but the score does not really reflect how the set unfolded especially the sixth 20-point game where Li Na gave Williams a run for her money.
Williams held serve to win her sixth consecutive game for 1-0. She made three forehand errors to drop the second game. Li Na posed some stiff resistance when Williams rallied from 0-40 to get her first break and took a 5-1 lead on her fifth break point after a very long 20-point game.
Williams fired an ace to win her 11th match in 12 head-to-head matches against Li Na improving her winning match record to 67-7 at Key Biscayne.
Williams is now the player who won more titles at Key Biscayne than everybody else as she has overtaken Steffi Graf who won this tournament five times. Williams and Graf are two of the four players who won the same tournament at least seven times. The other two players are Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova. Miami is the tournament where she has reached more finals than in any other tournament in the circuit.
“It was a really important win, especially playing against Li Na who has been playing so well. She started out so well. Then I heard some fans trying to pull me through. If it hadn’t for you guys, I wouldn’t be standing here right now. At that moment I felt like I had nothing to lose and I was able to relax. Whenever I relax, I enjoy myself”, said Williams
