Sara Bejlek Wins First WTA Title | Czech Tennis

The Czech Sara Bejlek won the first title of her career on the WTA circuit on Saturday at the age of 20 by beating the Russian Ekaterina Alexandrova, 11th in the world, in two sets of 7-6 and 6-1 in the final of the WTA 500 in Abu Dhabi.

Coming from qualifying, the left-hander signed a seventh victory in a row on the Emirati hard courts.

Falling in the second round to the Latvian Jelena Ostapenko (24th) and the Dane Clara Tauson (16th) in the semi-finals, Bejlek faced a clearly diminished player for the title.

At 4-3 in the first set, Alexandrova called a medical timeout and had her left shoulder massaged.

Second seed in the tournament, the Russian saved two first set points at 6-5 for Bejlek, but did not manage to put aside the third in the tiebreaker, losing 7-5 after more than 1 hour 10 minutes of fighting.

Entering the court with a bandage on the lower right leg, Bejlek encountered significantly less resistance in the second act, less than thirty minutes long, and won on yet another direct error from Alexandrova.

The Czech, whose best ranking until then was 75th place, will enter the top 50 for the first time thanks to her victory.

Despite her defeat, Alexandrova will return to the top 10 in the next WTA rankings.

Raducanu misses return to final

The British Emma Raducanu (30th in the world) was swept away 6-0, 6-2 by the Romanian Sorana Cirstea (36th) on Saturday in the final of the WTA 250 tournament in Cluj-Napoca, her first final since her surprise coronation at the US Open in 2021.

Four and a half years after becoming in New York the first player in the Open era to win a Grand Slam from qualifying, the first seed in the tournament had a disastrous start to the match, conceding the first eight games to her opponent.

Trailing 6-0, 2-0, Raducanu snatched a first game on his opponent’s serve, before asking to take his blood pressure when changing sides.

Obviously not in the best form, the Briton nevertheless managed to pick up two games everywhere before conceding the last four and losing in just over an hour.

In her native country, Cirstea won the fourth title of her career on the WTA circuit at the age of 35.

Before winning in Cluj-Napoca, the Romanian who is playing the last season of her career had already been crowned in Tashkent in 2008, in Istanbul in 2021 and in Cleveland last year.