Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova claimed her biggest career title by defeating Sara Errani 3-6 6-2 6-3 in the final of the $710,000 Open GDF SUEZ. After victories over Francesca Schiavone in the first round, seventh seed Carla Suarez Navarro in the second, fourth seed Angelique Kerber in the quarterfinals and top seed Maria Sharapova in the semis, Pavlyuchenkova went ahead right at the beginning of her big final, taking a 3-1 lead early on, but then her opponent struck and the Russian found herself trailing 6-3 2-0 before winning seven straight games to level the match and lead 1-0 in the decider. The third-seeded Errani then won three straight games for 3-1, but Pavlyuchenkova took charge again, taking five games in a row and dropping just six points in the process to run away with the match on her 48th winner of the day.
Another Russian was triumphant this week. At the International-level tournament played this week, the PTT Pattaya Open, the fourth-seeded Ekaterina Makarova played three three-setters of four matches to reach the final against Karolina Pliskova, who served six aces in her opening serving game and had two set points in the second set tiebreak but eventually fell to the 28th-ranked Russian 6-3 7-6(7). (photos: Jimmie48, ©Neal Trousdale)
