(Guadalajara) Garbiñe Muguruza, 5e world player, became the first Spaniard to win the WTA Masters, beating in the final 6-3, 7-5 Estonian Anett Kontaveit (8e), Wednesday in Guadalajara.
The winner of Roland-Garros in 2016 and Wimbledon in 2017 ends in the best way a year 2021 which has seen her return to the highest level, with two victories in Dubai and Chicago, after three years away from the top 10.
For his fourth participation in the event after 2015, 2016 and 2017, Muguruza played his first final. Unlike Arantxa Sanchez who was the first from her country to reach this stage in 1993, finally beaten by the German Steffi Graff, at Madison Square Garden in New York, she did not let the opportunity to win it pass.
Kontaveit, first-time participant, who owed her presence in Mexico to its thunderous end of the season, marked by four titles won, between the end of August and the end of October, in Cleveland, Ostrava, Moscow and Cluj, was nevertheless a rival not to be underestimated .
And to the dazzling form of the Estonian, Muguruza contrasted her experience of major meetings which certainly served her in the approach of the meeting and in the key moments of the meeting.
She was the best entry into the final, breaking for the first time to lead 2-1, before her opponent immediately returned the favor. A good reaction which did not then prevent her from making too many unforced errors, again giving up her commitment in the seventh game.
Muguruza, more solid, was able to pocket the first set, thanks to a superb defensive lob after a long exchange, once again on the service of Kontaveit.
The latter made sure to force her fate in the second set, resisting many break points for her to convert one and lead 4-3, then 5-3. But the Spaniard regained her counter tennis and her ball length, which destabilized her rival, to win the next four games and win in 1 h 39 min.