Germany's Hack wins Indonesia Open
Germany's Hack wins Indonesia Open
JAKARTA (JP): Top seed Sabine Hack of Germany struck back to fight off a scaring Irina Spirlea of Rumania on her way to winning the Indonesia Women's Open title yesterday.
Hack, ranked number 19 in the world, dropped the opening set and was 1-5 down in the second before storming to a 2-6, 7-6 (8- 6), 6-4 win and US$26,500 of top prize money in the marathon final match at the Senayan indoor tennis stadium.
A solid baseliner Spirlea, unleashing her powerful forehand strokes, got off to a fine start and was on verge to a convincing ending when she served for a win at 5-2 in the second set.
But while the organizers were preparing a prize presentation ceremony, resilient Hack forced Spirlea to play long rallies that the Rumanian failed to cope with.
Despite her blasting serves, sixth seed Spirlea netted her shaky backhand drives twice for a break. Hack continued to come charging to produce another break as a nervous Spirlea drilled her unforced errors.
The German attempted a safe play with her overhead lobs but it proved worthless. She hit every ball wide and double faulted once to hand Spirlea her third chance to win the match.
But Spirlea, who edged out home favorite Yayuk Basuki on Saturday, looked to run out of steam to match an agile Hack. The Rumanian squandered her own serve and was left trailing during the tiebreak.
A bad call ruling in the sixth game of the deciding set cost Hack a broken serve. She kept on the pressures, however, as lackluster Spirlea let herself be the receiving end in the final two games.
Hack took full advantage of her only chance to serve for a win, pouring down her half-swing but tricky serves to seal the match.
"I just kept moving to maintain the pressures when I was 1-5 down," Hack, who claimed her fifth career title, said after the match. "I went on with my pressure in the third set since I knew Irina was very tired."
Hack expressed her disappointment over a bad turn-out during the final. There were only around 100 spectators filling the 3,000-seat stadium, only one twentieth as much those who watched Martina Navratilova playing Yayuk Basuki last Friday.
The victory was a comfortable tune-up for Hack who will make a trip to the Australia Open, the opening Grand Slam tournament, in Melbourne, starting on Jan. 16.
"I should have taken on Yayuk to attract more spectators," said Hack.
Spirlea received a consolation win in the doubles. Teaming up with Germany's Claudia Porwik, Spirlea made a short work of Belgian seventh seeds Laurence Courtois and Nancy Feber 6-3, 6-1.
The $161,000 tournament was officially an outdoor one, but the organizers decided to staged yesterday's finals indoor in anticipation for the heavy rain which had earlier interrupted Friday's matches.(amd)