New York: Women’s doubles top seeds Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis defeated fourth seeded Casey Dellacqua and Yaroslava Shvedova 6-3, 6-3 here on Sunday to claim the US Open title.

The Indo-Swiss pair took only 69 minutes to conquer the Australian-Kazakh pair at the Arthur Ashe stadium.

It was Sania and Martina’s second women’s doubles Grand Slam title together after winning the Wimbledon earlier this year and they played with supreme confidence to win the tournament without dropping a set. It was Sania’s fifth success at the Majors (two women’s doubles and three mixed doubles crowns).

Sania’s partnership with Martina has helped her become the first Indian women’s player to be ranked World No. 1 in the doubles rankings.

Sunday’s final was Sania’s first in the category here at US Open. She won the mixed doubles title last year with Brazilian Bruno Soares here.

For Martina, the tournament turned out to be a memorable won as she lifted her second trophy at the Flushing Meadows this year on Sunday, after bagging the mixed doubles crown on Friday with another Indian, Leander Paes. It was also her fifth Grand Slam title this year, and 20th of her career across all three disciplines (five singles, 11 doubles and four mixed doubles).

The Swiss now just the third active player to have 20 major trophies (after Serena Willams’ 36 and Venus Williams’ 22).

On Sunday, the top seeds quickly jumped to a 3-1 lead breaking the second service game of their opponents.

But the fourth seeds immediately broke Sania’s serve to make it 2-3.

Sania-Martina though remained undeterred to bring about the third and fourth successive service breaks to extend their advantage to 5-2.

Sania then served out the first set at 6-3 in only 31 minutes. They hit 16 winners – four more than their opponents – to claim the first set, converting three of the eight break points. Dellacqua-Shvedova could only break their opponents once.

The reigning Wimbledon champions continued their dominant return of serves in the second set and broke their opponents to take an early 2-0 lead.

As the match went on, the top seeds grew more confident and started unleashing terrific ground strokes, both cross court and down the line, to march towards victory.

But they were made to wait for the win as Dellacqua-Shvedova converted their second break point to put up a resistance and reduce the margin to 3-5.

But that only delayed the inevitable as Martina put away a volley at the net to seal the fate of the match, with the pair clinching 62 of the total 108 points played.

Sania and Martina entered the title round easing past Italian 11th seeds Sara Errani and Flavia Pennetta 6-4, 6-1. Dellacqua-Shvedova defeated unseeded German-American pair of Anna-Lena Groenefeld and Coco Vandeweghe 6-7 (3), 7-5, 7-5 to reach the final.

“It has been a great year for us,” Sania said after the win.

“To win Wimbledon was a great year. Then to come back and back it up to win the US Open, we feel like we’re a really solid team. And we came through again today.”

“From the start, we hit it off,” Martina said.

“Our games work well together.”

(IANS)

New York: The Indo-Swiss tennis combine of Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis earned a straight sets victory to enter the women’s doubles semi-finals of the US Open at the Flushing Meadows here.

The top seeds took just an hour and 25 minutes to beat Chinese Taipei ninth seeds Yung-Jan Chan and Hao-Ching Chan 7-6(5), 6-1 on Tuesday. They will next take on Italian 11th seeds Sara Errani and Flavia Pennetta on Thursday for a place in the final.

Playing at the Louis Armstrong Stadium, the world’s top two players were equally matched in the first set by the Chan sisters. Both pairs broke the other twice which led the set into the tie-breaker where Sania and Martina lived up to their billing to take the lead in the match.

Having lost a closely fought first set, the Chan sisters were not as feisty in the second set and were broken twice to lose the second set and the match.

Overall, Sania and Martina won 70 of the 121 points played in the match and had more winners and less unforced errors.

Later, India’s Karman Kaur Thandi defeated Russian Evgeniya Levashova 6-2, 4-6, 6-3 to enter the girls singles third round where she will take on Hungarian second seed Dalma Galfi.

But it was the end of the road for Pranjala Yadlapalli, who partnering Mexican Jessica Hinojosa Gomez, lost the girls doubles opener 1-6, 0-6 to American pair of Tornado Alicia Black and Ingrid Neel.

(IANS)

Martina Hingis of Switzerland, left, and partner Sania Mirza, celebrate after winning their doubles match during the fourth round of the U.S. Open tennis tournament, Sunday | AP

New York: Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis eased into the women’s doubles quarterfinals at the US Open with a comfortable straight sets victory over Michaella Krajicek and Barbora Strycova here.

The top seeded Indo-Swiss combination produced a dominant performance to get the better of their 13th seeded opponents 6-3, 6-0 in 59 minutes.

Sania and Hingis were hardly stretched during the contest as they managed to hold their serve all through. They were off to a good start, breaking Krajicek and Strycova once in the first set.

They fired 14 winners in the opening set as against eight by their Dutch-Czech opponents.

Sania and Martina upped the ante in the second set, earning six break points, three of which they converted.

Krajicek and Strycova were clearly out of their depths, producing nine unforced errors as the Indo-Swiss duo wrapped up the second set in 26 minutes.

The top seeds will face Chan Yung-Jan and Chan Hao-Ching of Chinese Taipei in the last eight stage.

The Chinese Taipei pair, who are seeded ninth, prevailed in a tough contest with the unseeded Romanian duo of Irina-Camelia Begu and Raluca Olaru.

The ninth seeds conceeded the first set before fighting back to win 5-7, 6-1, 7-6 (4).

(IANS)