Tough and fast-paced, Iga Swiatek won the WTA Masters for the first time, defeating American Jessica Pegula 6-1, 6-0 on Monday in Cancun, Mexico, to further reclaim her spot as world number one. With a resounding end to the season, a month after winning the WTA 1000 in Beijing, the 22-year-old Pole is guaranteed to end 2023 at the top of the planetary pecking order for the second year in a row.
She knocks out Aryna Sabalenka, whom she sharply eliminated the day before in the semi-finals of the tournament (6-3, 6-2), thereby taking double revenge from the Belarusian, who beat her at the same stage of the Masters. last year and took control of the ranking in September 2023.
Swiatek, who replaced France’s Carolina Garcia as the top eight player of the year, won the 17th title of her career, her sixth in a season that included victory at Roland Garros.
Difficult weather
She dispatched Pegula in the final, originally scheduled for Sunday but delayed by rain, and finally won without blinking in just over an hour. “This week was not easy,” the Pole admitted after the tournament, which was complicated by rain and wind. The champion also thanked the presence of “all Polish flags” and “growing support from other countries.”
It was the ninth meeting between the two players: the Pole scored six wins to the American’s three. “Jessica, I want to congratulate you on a great season, it was not easy to play against you and I think we will continue to improve,” said the European, who has already faced the American four times in 2023.
The 29-year-old Pegula, world number five, nevertheless beat the Pole during their previous clash in August in Montreal. But then Swiatek was experiencing a less stable season than the previous one and playing much less dynamic tennis than in recent weeks.
The four-time winner of Grand Slam tournaments left her opponent only one game, which has never happened in the history of the tournament. In 2003, Belgium’s Kim Clijsters narrowly beat France’s Amelie Mauresmo 6–2, 6–0 in the final.
Source: Le Parisien
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