WTA: Premiere! Maria wins first title

Tatjana Maria has won the first WTA title of her career on Mallorca. In the final of the third edition of the grass court tournament, she beat Anastasiya Sevastova in two sets 6-4, 7-5, but Petra Kvitova won her next tournament in Birmingham.

“I would like to thank all the fans who have given me so much strength over the whole week”, Maria said after her success. “This year has been so hard on me, my husband and my family have always believed in me, thank you very much. I’ll never forget that day.”

In the first set, both players won their service games before Maria secured her tenth game to 15. However, the German could not take the momentum from the first set with her: After a few minutes she was 0:4 behind.

But then Maria started to catch up, scored 16 of the next 20 points and shortly afterwards set the score at 5-4. 30 year old missed two match points in the tenth game, but at 6-5 she lost her opponent’s serve again and after one hour and 36 minutes was allowed to stretch her hands into the Spanish sky.

With the victory, Maria also secured a cheque for 34,677 euros in prize money.

Another Wimbledon preparation tournament saw Kvitova take their fifth tournament victory in 2018, with Birmingham defending champions again winning this year and beating Magdalena Rybarikova 4-6, 6-1, 6-2 in the final.

No other player has won more titles in the current season, and her 37 match victories are also top marks. With 34 winners and 70 per cent points won at her opponent’s second serve, the Czech won after two hours and five minutes.

This puts the 28-year-old in second place in the Race to Singapore. Australian Open winner Caroline Wozniacki overtook her, only French Open champion Simona Halep is still ahead of her.