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Indian Wells Ambience 2019
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Zvonareva scraps her way to Doha final


The remarkable run of Vera Zvonareva at the Sony Ericsson WTA Championships continues. The Russian is through to the final in Doha after a 7-6(7) 3-6 6-3 victory over compatriot Elena Dementieva.

The lowest ranked player to have qualified by right, the world No.9 came intothe semi-final undefeated after the round-robin stage, with victories against Ana Ivanovic, Svetlana Kuznetsova and world No.1 Jelena Jankovic yesterday.

Both players struggled with their serve throughout…

The 24-year-old is now one match away from the biggest title of her career – and took a little revenge for her semi-final defeat at the Beijing Olympics, where Dementieva went on to claim gold.

Both players struggled with their serve throughout, both players being broken six times and neither hitting a single ace as they failed to produce their best tennis.

But Dementieva’s was particularly poor, nine double faults – compared to three from Zvonareva – perhaps a sign of fatigue following her three-set workout against Nadia Petrova yesterday.

No.5 seed Dementieva served for the first set twice, at 5-4 and 6-5, and she held a set point in the tiebreak at 7-6 before losing three points on the bounce 9-7.

Both players settled down and produced some decent rallies at times. But Zvonareva dropped her serve with a double-fault to fall behind 2-0, and then wasted a break point when down 3-1. The break proved crucial, as Dementieva levelled the match.

The No.8 seed quickly regained the upper hand in the final set, breaking for 2-0 when Dementieva produced a backhand error.

And although the Russian broke back at 4-2, another poor backhand allowed Zvonareva to break once more and serve out the match to love.


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Tim Farthing, Tennishead Editorial Director & Owner, has been a huge tennis fan his whole life. He's a tennis journalist and entrepreneur as well as playing tennis to a national standard. He also helps manage his local club and volunteers for his local tennis organisation. He's a specialist in content about the administration of professional tennis and tennis coaching for all levels.