MADRID – Ons Jabeur achieved another milestone in her surging career, when the No.8 seed from Tunisia outlasted No.12 seed Jessica Pegula 7-5, 0-6, 6-2 to win the Madrid Open for her first WTA 1000 title.
Jabeur survived both a set point in the first set and a second-set bagel before gritting her way to a topsy-turvy 1-hour and 54-minute victory over the American Pegula.
World No.10 Jabeur, who became the first Arab woman to win a Hologic WTA Tour singles title last year at Birmingham, claims her second career title.
Jabeur and Pegula were deadlocked at 2-2 in their head-to-head coming into Saturday’s final, but Jabeur had won their last two encounters. Their four previous meetings had come on hard court, and in their first clay-court clash, it was Jabeur who came out on top once more.
The triumph helped improve Jabeur’s record in WTA singles finals. Jabeur was just 1-4 in finals before prevailing over Pegula, including a tight three-set loss to Belinda Bencic in the Charleston championship match last month.
Nevertheless, that Charleston result, along with a quarterfinal run in Stuttgart, is part of her 12 clay-court match-wins so far this season, which leads the tour on the surface thus far in 2022.
With her biggest career title in her pocket, 27-year-old Jabeur is projected to return to her career-high position of World No.7 in Monday’s new rankings.
Pegula could have made her Top 10 debut with the title, but the 28-year-old American is still projected to reach a new career-high ranking of No.11 on Monday after making the biggest final of her career.
Pegula matched Jabeur drop shot for drop shot in the early going as the American built a 4-1 lead. Jabeur pulled back on serve, but Pegula was still the first to reach set point, on Jabeur’s serve at 5-4.
But a backhand winner by Jabeur erased that chance, and the Tunisian turned the set around from there. She fired a backhand return winner to break Pegula at love for 6-5, then served out the set.
Untimely errors by Jabeur while down break points put her in a deep hole in the second set, which Pegula won without the loss of a game. Jabeur, however, earned a crucial love break to lead 2-1 in the third set and regain momentum.
Extravagant all-court rallies helped Jabeur jump to 5-2 in the decider, and the Tunisian came back from 0-30 down in the following game to reach championship point with a forehand winner. There, Jabeur closed out the clash, adding to her groundbreaking accolades.
Jabeur ended the match with her 29 winners more than doubling Pegula’s total of 14, and the Tunisian had only one more unforced error than Pegula.
