© Getty Images Sport – Clive Brunskill
Iga Swiatek admitted that she entered the Doha final versus Elena Rybakina feeling “pretty stressed” because she knew what was at the stake and she badly wanted to claim another win in Qatar and achieve a very impressive feat.
Playing for her third Doha title, world No. 1 Swiatek got off to a pretty rough start against Rybakina as the Kazakh claimed two early breaks for a 4-1 lead. When Rybakina went up by a double break on Swiatek, the Kazakh was all over the Pole and the one controlling the rhythm and the match.
But Swiatek managed to find a way to get back into the first set and eventually win it with a 10-8 scoreline in the first-set tie-break. It took an hour and 27 minutes for the first set to be concluded.
After stealing the first set from Rybakina, Swiatek went on to complete a 7-6 (8) 6-2 win over the Kazakh and win her third consecutive Doha title. By completing a Doha three-peat, Swiatek became the first player to win Doha three times and also the first player since Serena Williams to win a single tournament in three consecutive years – the American won Miami for three years in a row between 2013 and 2015.
“You don’t even know how hard it was not to think about it. I came here and I was just pretty…
