Miami: Johanna Konta defeated Caroline Wozniacki 6-4, 6-3 to win the Miami Open yesterday – the biggest title won by a British woman in 40 years.
Konta, who had never won an elite WTA premier mandatory event, will move to number seven in the world rankings with the victory.
She began superbly, breaking to love in the opening game before Wozniacki swiftly broke back to level at 2-2. After another break each, the Briton took advantage of two double-faults from the Dane to break to 5-4 and serve out for the set.
There was a similar pattern to the start of the second set, with the pair exchanging breaks in the first two game. The key moment came when Konta broke to go 4-3 up, with a little help from the net cord.
Konta then broke again, with a lob on match-point, to secure the biggest win of her career and the best by a British woman since Virginia Wade won Wimbledon in 1977.
It was Wozniacki’s third final of the year and third defeat following her loses in Dubai and Doha.
“I was hoping it was going to be third time lucky in my third final but we will go for the fourth one,” said Wozniacki.
Speaking on court she said “Congratulations Johanna, you played really well today, you deserved the win, you played better than me.”
Konta claimed her second title of the year, after a triumph in Sydney. She has now won both her matches with former world number one Wozniacki after beating her in the Australian Open in January.
On the men’s side, Roger Federer needed more than three hours to outlast Nick Kyrgios 7-6(9) 6-7(9) 7-6(5) in a pulsating semi-final on Friday to set up another mouthwatering final clash with Rafa Nadal.
The Swiss, who has won two of his last three tournaments including the Australian Open, had to dig deep to get through a second straight test after fending off a match point in his quarter-final victory over Tomas Berdych.
The 35-year-old’s victory sets up a re-match of January’s Melbourne Park title-decider against Spaniard Nadal, who earlier rolled over unseeded Italian Fabio Fognini 6-1 7-5.
Kyrgios, who has twice beaten Novak Djokovic over the last month, left his racket a twisted heap on the court after coming up short in a battle against the former world number one and a partisan crowd.
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In their only previous match in Madrid in 2015, the Australian came out on top in a similar three-set thriller that went to three tiebreaks with the last decided 14-12.
“It’s great winning this way, especially of course I remember the loss against him few years ago,” Federer said. “I know I can’t always show my fighting skills because everything else sort of takes over.”
The temperamental Kyrgios came apart in the late stages of the last tiebreak after a fan yelled out when he was leading 5-4 and he miscued a forehand.
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