Slovakia's Dalila Jakupovic beats Xinyun Han to retain ITF crown

Aurangabad: Unseeded Dalila Jakupovic of Slovakia upset eighth seed Xinyun Han of China in three well- fought sets in the singles final to retain the title at the USD 25,000 Endurance Aurangabad Open Women's ITF Tennis Championships here today.

The 23-year-old Slovak, ranked 367th in the world, got the better of a fighting Xinyun 6-7(5) 6-4 6-4 in a battle lasting nearly 2 hours and 45 minutes at the EMMTC tennis courts.

Jakupovic, who won a double crown here last year, proved that this city was a good hunting ground for her as she overcame dehydration and the heat to dash the dream of her 20 -year-old Chinese rival's maiden title win on the circuit.

In the evenly-contested first set Xinyun got the better of Jakupovic via the tie-break.

In the second, scores were level till 4-4 when Jakupovic broke Xinyun and then held her serve to win the set and draw level.
After a 10-minute break both the players played long rallies before the Chinese was broken in the 9th game again to trail 4-5.

Jakupovic held her serve to claim her first USD 25,000 event on the circuit.

While the winner received 50 WTA points and prize money of USD 3,919 (Rs 2.5 lakh), the runner-up secured 25 points and prize money of USD 2,091 (Rs 1.25 lakh).

The third seeded pair of Ya-Hsuan Lee of Taipei and Varatchaya Wongteanchai of Thailand claimed the doubles title by registering a 6-1 7-6(4) win over Ching-Wen Hsu and Pei-Chi Lee of Taipei in the final.

The doubles winners got 50 WTA points and shared USD 1,437 (Rs 93,000), while the runners-up received 25 points and USD 719 (Rs 46,000).