Staff Reporter.
Ons Jabeur won the fifth WTA title of her career with an emphatic victory over surprise-package Diana Shnaider in the final of the Ningbo Open in China on Saturday.
The seventh-ranked Tunisian demolished the unseeded Shnaider 6-2, 6-1 for her first hardcourt title.
Top seed Jabeur took a last-minute wildcard into the tournament and it took her all the way to the final.
The Moscow-born 19-year-old Shnaider, who is 85th in the world, had enjoyed a dream run to her first WTA final.
She defeated two-time Grand Slam champion Petra Kvitova on the way to the championship match.
But she wilted in the face of Jabeur’s superior power and precision, and her title dream was snuffed out in just 78 minute.
At the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo, second-seeded Jessica Pegula’s impressive week continued as the American surged to a 6-2, 6-3 victory over fourth-seeded Maria Sakkari in the semifinals.
Pegula has lost just nine games in her three matches and will meet eighth-seeded Veronika Kudermetova in Sunday’s final.
“When you’re top-ranked, I think it just depends on how you play that day and how you execute your game plan, and some days it’s better than others,” Pegula said. “I think the faster courts here probably help me a little more than the slower surfaces I’ve played her in the past, so I tried to take advantage of that.”
In the earlier semifinal, Kudermetova edged past Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova -6 (6), 6-7 (2), 6-3.
At the Astana Open, top-seeded Tallon Griekspoor defeated qualifier Sho Shimabukuro 7-6 (5), 6-7 (4), 6-1 to advance to the quarterfinals.
Local favorite and third-seeded Alexander Bublik and fifth-seeded Sebastian Korda play their respective second-round matches later Saturday.