Dominika Cibulkova fought back from one set down to claim a thrilling 3-6 6-3 6-4 win over Svetlana Kuznetsova in a two-hour and 35-minute marathon match and secured her spot in the final at the Dongfeng Motor Wuhan Open. Cibulkova has reached her first final since beating Karolina Pliskova in Eastbourne last June. Thanks to her great result in Wuhan Slovakian will return to the top 10 next week.
Kuznetsova won 12 of her 15 points on Cibulkova’s second serve and broke three times to ease through to a comfortable 6-3 in the first set.
Cibulkova was forced by rain to play both the third round and the quarter final matches on Thursday when she beat Karolina Pliskova 6-2 6-2 and Barbora Strykova 6-3 3-6 6-4 in a late-night match.
Cibulkova hit a couple of drop shots to break in the first game of the second set. Her lead did not last long, as Kuznetsova broke back in the fourth game to draw level to 2-2 but Cibulkova broke twice in the fifth and ninth games to win four of the last five games to force the match to the third set.
The third set went on serve until the ninth game when Cibulkova rallied from 15-30 down to hold serve at 4-4. She brought up three match points in the next game and broke serve on the first opportunity to book her spot in her fifth final of the season.
“It feels great. I am really tired right now, but the feeling to be in the final is unbelievable, and that’s why I love. It’s just a great win for me today. I would say that nothing has been easy here. I have had really tough matches from the first round, so you don’t expect anything easy from the tournament. I am really looking forward to another final and I want to keep going, keep playing like this”, said Cibulkova.
Cibulkova claimed her fifth consecutive win against Kuznetsova to extend her lead to 5-3 in her head-to-head matches against the Russian player.
Cinulkova will face Petra Kvitova in tomorrow’s final. Kvitova beat Simona Halep 6-1 6-2 in just 67 minutes to reach her first final in 13 months. The Czech player fended off all three break points she faced to beat Halep for the first time.
Kvitova broke twice to take a 4-0 lead. Halep got her first game on the scoreboard to avoid a bagel in the sixth game but Kvitova closed out the first set to love. The Czech got two more breaks in the third and fifth games to cruise through to 6-2 in the second set.
Kvitova won four of her six head-to-head matches against Cibulkova, but the Slovakian player claimed their last two clashes, including a 6-3 6-2 win at Indian Wells in 2014.
Kvitova will play in her first final since her title at New Haven in 2015.
