Paolini fights back to win Dubai Duty Free Championships

Italian Jasmine Paolini battled back from a set and a break down in the final of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships to win 4-6, 7-5, 7-5, to secure her first WTA 1000 title and spoil qualifier Anna Kalinskaya’s fairytale week.

Kalinskaya had produced some of the biggest shocks of the week as the World No 40 overcame 2022 winner Jelena Ostapenko in the Round of 16, edged World No 3 Coco Gauff in the quarterfinals and beat four-time Grand Slam winner Swiatek in straight sets.

As a capacity crowd filed into their seats to watch two players contesting their first WTA 1000 final, it was Kalinskaya – making her Main Draw debut in Dubai this week after coming through two rounds of qualifying – who settled first, breaking a nervous Paolini in the first game.

The Italian, ranked No 26 in the world, gradually grew into the match, though, breaking back in the fourth to take the set to 2-2 before the pair, who met last month at the Australian Open with Kalinskaya coming out on top, exchanged successive breaks.

In the ninth game, Kalinskaya broke serve once more to take a 5-4 lead and after serving her first ace of the match – a 172kph thunderbolt – she served out for the first set.

The second set started similar to the first, with Kalinskaya breaking in the first game with a thunderous winner. Yet once more she let her lead slip, this time in the sixth.

With the crowd baying for a third set, Paolini found herself in the ascendancy, pulling her opponent around the court, forcing errors, and eventually breaking in the 12th to take the set 7-5.

Kalinskaya took the lead once more in the third set, but again failed to pull away, seeing her own service game broken immediately by a fired up Paolini. Undeterred, the qualifier broke again to take the outright lead and this time held it for much of the deciding set.

Yet serving for the championship, Kalinskaya’s game evaporated as she double-faulted, started overcooking forehands, and found the net with an unnecessary drop shot that allowed Paolini to stay in the match with a crucial break.

After serving for the match, Kalinskaya found herself needing to break her opponent, but Paolini was unaccommodating, showing ferocity to close out the match and take her first title since October and first above WTA 250 level.

The win is expected to project her into the Top-15 when the WTA’s latest rankings are released next week.

“It’s so special, I’m really happy and really surprised, I don’t know what to say,” an emotional, smiling Paolini said on-court after securing the biggest win of her career. “I’m just happy that I believed I could win every match. I remember my first match this week - It was second set, I’d lost the first and was a break down, yet now I’m here winning the title. It’s unbelievable.”

Meanwhile, the doubles final saw No4 seeded Storm Hunter and Katerina Siniakova triumph over No3 seeds Nicole Melichar-Martinez and Ellen Perez 6-4, 6-2.

. @LatifaMRM presents trophies to winners of the 24th #Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships.https://t.co/jyFgNdniwo pic.twitter.com/hEFC928TPi

— Dubai Media Office (@DXBMediaOffice) February 24, 2024