Ana Ivanovic cripples Anabel Garrigues in successful title defence – Tournament of Champions 2011
A wild card entrant and the defending champion, Ana Ivanovic crushed Spaniard Anabel Medina Garrigues with a bagel to lift the title at the 2011 Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions, a third edition of the WTA Tour taking
place on the indoor hard courts in Bali, Indonesia. She registered a 6-3, 6-0 victory over the 29-year-old Spaniard to lift her maiden title of the season on her birthday.
A former world number one Ivanovic re-created her old magic to crush the Spaniard, ranked twenty-seventh in the Sony Ericsson WTA Premier rankings, on their fourth meeting. She not only extended her lead in the head-to-head series
by 3-1 against Garrigues but also grabbed her eleventh WTA career title.
The Serb cruised into the final WTA event of the season and wiped out first three games through exquisite forehands from her arsenal of skills. She then maintained consistency in her game to bag remaining serves and clinched the
opener with a 6-3 win.
24-year-old went berserk in the final set as she unleashed flurry of groundstrokes to reel off all six games in a row and earned a bagel.
Overall, the Basel resident, Ivanovic faced zero breakpoint and cashed in four out of nine breakpoint opportunities to her advantage. She also clobbered a slightly higher first serve share of 66 percent as opposed to Garrigues’
64 percent and registered an incredible 78 percent win on it.
"I felt like I didn't do much wrong. It was a great match for me," said the blooming Serb in her on-court interview. "Anabel and I practiced together all week, so it was nice we got a chance to play each other on the last day of
the tournament."
She stated further, "I'm super relaxed here, and that helps. I come here to compete, but I also spend lots of time on the beach and in the spa, and the people are so friendly - I've made many new friends. It's just so enjoyable
here. It feels great to play here.”
Ivanovic didn’t win any title this year but received a wild card entry. The Serb displayed exceptional skills throughout the tournament, snapping out from her two-match losing streak by slaying Italian Roberta Vinci with a 6-3,
6-3 win. She then carried her winning ways into the last four and destroyed Nadia Petrova with a breadstick.
The Spaniard on the other hand made her biggest WTA career final here. She stunned top seed French Marion Bartoli and third seed German Sabine Lisicki to set-up this clash.
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