Emma Raducanu missed the chance to win her first title since winning the 2021 US Open after losing in straight sets to home favorite Sorana Cirstea in the Transylvania Open final.
Top seed Raducanu appeared to be feeling the effects of her marathon semi-final victory against Ukraine’s Oleksandra Oliynykova on Friday as she lost 6-0, 6-2 to Cirstea in just over an hour in Cluj.
Romanian Cirstea, 35 and in her last year on the Tour, sealed the fourth WTA title of her twenty-year career.
Raducanu, whose father is Romanian, was pushed to the limit in her last four match against Oliynykova 24 hours earlier and had no answers for Cirstea’s big blow.
The British No. 1 came under pressure early, eventually losing her opening game after saving five break points, and she went on to lose the first set without winning a game in just 30 minutes.
After losing a fourth straight service game and trailing 2-0 in the second set, Raducanu broke Cirstea eager to win her first game but then needed a medical timeout.
She recovered and then held serve for the first time to reach 2–2, but could not maintain her momentum as Cirstea took the next three games and led 5–2.
Raducanu seemed to have nothing left in the tank as she served to stay in the match and in the next game she lost her serve for the sixth time as Cirstea took the title.
There was better news for British number 4 Katie Boulter, who won her first WTA title since June 2024 at the Ostrava Open. Boulter, ranked 120 in the world, lost the first set 7-5 to Germany’s Tamara Korpatsch but fought back impressively to win the second set 6-2 and the decider 6-1 to seal an emphatic victory in the Czech Republic.
She climbs to 84th in the world rankings after completing her victory in exactly two hours, adding her latest tournament win to previous successes in Nottingham (twice) and San Diego.
At the Abu Dhabi Open, Czech qualifier Sara Bejlek recorded a surprise first WTA Tour victory by beating Ekaterina Alexandrova 7-6 (5), 6-1 in the final. The 20-year-old climbs from 101 in the rankings to the top 50 after the best week of her career.
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