Dubai: Sania Mirza clinched her second doubles title of the season on Saturday after she combined with partner Bethanie Mattek-Sands to defeat Nadia Petrova and Katarina Srebotnik in the title clash of the Dubai Tennis Championships.
The unseeded Indo-American duo prevailed over the Russian-Slovenia combo 6-4, 2-6, 10-7 in a tightly-contested final of the hard court event.
After a rather easy victory in the first set, the eventual winners were made to struggle as Petrova and Srebotnik fought back strongly to take the second set.
Sania and Bethanie, however, sealed the issue in their favour by winning the crucial match tie-breaker
The two players had won the Brisbane International last month to make a superb start to the 2013 season.
This was Sania’s 16th championships wins in doubles, and she also has one single title win.
Both the pairs had two aces each but Petrova and Srebotnik, interestingly, committed just one double fault compared to three by the Indo-American duo. (PTI)
