Estoril Open News and Events

2009 Doubles Champions

© Joao Lagos Sports

Raquel Kops-Jones and Abigail Spears won their first Sony Ericsson WTA Tour team title at the Estoril Open on Saturday, when the third-seeded Americans beat Sharon Fichman of Canada and Hungarian Katalin Marosi 2-6, 6-3, 10-5 (Match TB) in 74 minutes.

Kops-Jones and Spears, who has previously made a run to the quarter-final in Miami (l. to Peschke-Raymond) this year, won just eight points on return of serve in the first set but managed to turn around their 13th match of the season.

In the Match Tie-break, Kops-Jones and Spears won three points against serve to open up an 8-4 lead which they coolly converted into their eighth win of the year.

“We’re pretty happy that we came away with that win,” said Kops-Jones. “It was an up and down match, so we were very happy to pull that one out.

“We’ve actually played four match tie-breaks in a row this week, so we felt confident once we managed to take the match into the tiebreak."

The American duo had fought back from a one-set and 5-0 deficit in Friday’s semi-finals against Julie Coin and Marie-Eve Pelletier for a 3-6, 7-5, 10-3 (Match TB) win.

For Kops-Jones it was her second Sony Ericsson WTA Tour title after partnering Christina Fusano in Quebec City (d. Dubois-Varacova) in November 2007.

Spears has now four tour-level trophies, including 2003 Auckland (w/Ashley), 2004 Vancouver (w/Mattek), 2005 Cincinnati (w/Granville). She also finished runner-up at 2005 Memphis (w/Granville).

“We’ve been playing together for the last couple of years, and while we’ve won smaller tournaments together, we’ve never won a Sony Ericsson WTA Tour title as a team before," said Spears.

“Our game styles match up really well. We like coming to the net a lot, the more we play together the better we can read each other’s games and we’re also good friends, which helps!”