Sabine Lisicki played her way into the final of the Challenger tournament in Taipei with a hard-fought three-set success. For the 29-year-old, it is the first final since September 2014.
After 2:08 hours, Lisicki, number 262 in the WTA ranking, converted her first match ball to 1:6, 6:3, 7:5 in the semi-final against the Russian Vitalia Diatchenko, who is 130 places ahead of the Berlin player in the world ranking.
Lisicki’s most recent final was in September 2014, when she won her fourth and final singles title in Hong Kong. Afterwards she had to fight with big injury problems and continuing form weakness.
Lisicki, who started into the main draw with a wildcard, will face Luksika Kumkhum from Thailand, number 81 in the world rankings, who is seeded number two, in the final of the penultimate station of the “WTA 125s” series.
Lisicki had already led 3-0 and two breaks in the third set. But Diatchenko won four games in a row. However, the German did not allow herself to be put off and took the serve from the Russian for the decisive 6-5 lead. After that, she managed to perform the service she has rarely let down in this tournament week.
In a final win, Lisicki would advance to 164th place in the upcoming world rankings, and in a defeat would be led by 200th place.