Kaia Kanepi bounces past Lucie Safarova into title match – Kremlin Cup 2011
Estonian Kaia Kanepi made an epic comeback to earn a straight set victory over the Czech Republic’s Lucie Safarova at the Kremlin Cup 2011, a WTA premier event taking place on the indoor hard courts in Moscow, Russia. She registered
a 6-7(4), 6-4, 6-3 victory over the 24-year-old Czech to secure a final spot on Saturday.
In a hard hitting match which saw both blooming stars smashing ten aces, Kanepi ranked 43rd in the Sony Ericsson WTA Premier rankings overpowered the Czech, ranked sixteen spots above her, on their sixth meeting. Despite
losing four straight matches against Safarova, the Estonian turned the table around to lower the trail by 2-4 in their head-to-head series.
Both stars played their best tennis in the opening set.
Safarova founded four breakpoint chances and converted half to her advantage.
The Estonian on the other hand played with same spirit and converted two out of five breakpoint opportunities to her advantage.
The opener went to a tie-breaker where the Czech dominated to secure a 7-6(4) win.
The furious Kanepi raised the bar of her game in the second set and got the first blood in the opening game to take the initial lead. She maintained her form in the remaining games and smoothly held her serves without facing any
breakpoint. The Estonian capitalised on one out of five breakpoint chances to her advantage to bag the equaliser with a 6-4 score line.
26-year-old Estonian kept her momentum into the final set and after breaking Safarova’s serve twice, she went 5-2 up. Kanepi later exchanged a break to clinch the decider by winning six games to three.
"We had long rallies and long points. Lucie's a very tough opponent," the delighted Kanepi said. "It was a tough match and I hope to be ready for my next match too. Dominika hits hard and fast so I have to make sure to stay in
the rallies."
Up next for the Estonian is the eight seeded Slovak Dominika Cibulkova who is 0-3 in her career in WTA finals. She crushed unseeded Russian Elena Vesnina with a bagel in sixty-five minutes to set-up this clash.
"I'm really happy to be in another final, my second final in two weeks," the Slovak said. "I know I don't have any WTA titles but I'm sure sooner or later it'll come. I don't want to make a big deal out of it. I just want to go
out there and play my best tennis and if it comes I'll be really happy. We will see."
Kanepi is 2-0 in the head-to-head series against the Slovak regardless of overpowering in three sets on both encounters.
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