Translated material
Internal Affairs
Two Russians played for the main prize in Doha again
Russian Maria Sharapova won her second victory this season. Following the Australian Open, the tennis player conquered Doha. The current title, won in singles, was the 18th in the champion’s career. In total, since the beginning of the season, Sharapova, taking into account the opening match of the Federation Cup, has prevailed in 14 games in a row.The final match in Doha took place with the participation of two Russians - Sharapova and Zvonareva. It is worth noting that this is not the first time that the Russian women's derby crowns the tournament in Qatar. For two years in a row, in 2003 and 2004, Anastasia Myskina celebrated her victory here, who first beat Elena Likhovtseva, and a year later, Svetlana Kuznetsova. Four years later, on the same court, Sharapova defeated Vera Zvonareva - 6:1, 2:6, 6:0.
This fight initially seemed very tense, since in seven personal fights Sharapova won four, Zvonareva won three. The last word remained with Zvonareva: in 2007 in Indian Wells she sensationally beat Sharapova, at that time the first racket of the world. And this circumstance was a good irritant for Maria, whose answer was more than convincing.
The current final confrontation lasted almost an hour and a half, the key moment of which was the beginning of the third set. After the match, Vera Zvonareva spoke about this. According to her, the first game in the third game was really very important, and her loss on her serve actually decided the outcome of the fight in Sharapova’s favor. “Maria played very aggressively and left me no chance of winning,” Zvonareva stated sadly. Sharapova noted that she was unable to demonstrate her best game in the final. But when you play five matches in a row over five days of competition, it's extremely difficult to do that.
Despite the fact that almost all the leading tennis players were entered in the tournament, with the exception of last year's Belgian champion Justine Henin, few were able to demonstrate serious claims to the trophy. Some, like Anna Chakvetadze, were hampered by fatigue. The Federation Cup and the next victory at the tournament in Paris took quite a lot of energy from her. And this was followed by a natural decline, as evidenced by the tournaments in Antwerp and Doha.
Anna Ivanovic from Serbia withdrew due to injury, giving Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska the opportunity to advance to the semi-finals. Jelena Yankovic traditionally cannot cope with her inconvenient opponent, Chinese Na Li. Last year's finalist Svetlana Kuznetsova sheathed her racket ahead of schedule, explaining that it was simply impossible to play in such conditions and such wind. After the lost match to Sibylle Bummer from Austria, the Russian said the following: “Yes, I thought that this could happen. And yet, during the game, several times the thought came to me: when will they reschedule the match, the conditions are terrible. I couldn’t even hit the ball normally, but I continued to fight to still get the match, but it didn’t work out.” The results of the match between American Venus Williams and Slovakian Dominika Cibulkova should also be assessed through the prism of weather troubles. However, be that as it may, all this does not detract from the merits of the finalists, especially Vera Zvonareva, who for the first time in her career reached the final of a tournament of this rank.
For the victory in Doha, Sharapova earned 414 thousand dollars, Zvonareva - 211 thousand dollars. However, the main achievement for Zvonareva was that she managed to return to the top ten best tennis players in the world. In the WTA championship race, Sharapova is still in first position with 1465 points. The Russian woman is separated by 575 points from her closest pursuer Anna Ivanovic from Serbia. In third place is Justine Henin from Belgium with 800 points. In fourth is Elena Yankovic - 635. Vera Zvonareva is eighth - 437. In addition to Sharapova and Zvonareva, two more Russians are in the top ten: Anna Chakvetadze is ninth (368), followed by Svetlana Kuznetsova (345).
The list of top 10 in the BTA ranking looks somewhat different. Justine Henin retains first place, the best of the Russians, Svetlana Kuznetsova, is third. Two more of our compatriots, Maria Sharapova and Anna Chakvetadze, occupy fifth and sixth places, respectively.