Tennis: Watson wins first WTA title

The 20-year-old squandered one match point while leading one set and hit a double fault on 5-4.

OSAKA: Heather Watson edged past Taiwan’s Chang Kai-chen in a marathon final at the Japan Women’s Open tennis tournament yesterday to become the first British woman to take a WTA singles title since 1988. The 20-year-old, in her first WTA final, squandered one match point while leading one set and hit a double fault on 5-4. She had to save four match points in the final set before winning 7-5, 5-7, 7-6 (7/4) after a match lasting three hours and 11 minutes. Watson, however, failed to achieve a twin triumph when she and Japan’s Kimiko Date-Krumm lost the doubles final to top-seed Raquel Kops-Jones and Abigail Spears of the US 1-6, 4-6. “I’ve worked so hard for this moment my whole career,” said Watson. “That’s why I practised so hard, ran all those miles and lifted all those weights.”

Published in The Express Tribune, October 15^th, 2012.