Russian Khromacheva won the most important title of her career. The TBS champion helped her with this.
Alexander Nasonov September 16, 2024, 07:15 Moscow time Audio version: Your browser does not support the audio element.
In the final in Guadalajara, Irina and her partner Anna Danilina defeated Kamilla Rakhimova and Oksana Kalashnikova.
On the night of September 15-16 Moscow time, the final match of the WTA-500 doubles tournament was held in Guadalajara. The decisive match at the Mexican “500” was reached by pairs, each of which included a Russian tennis player. Irina Khromacheva teamed up with the representative of Kazakhstan Anna Danilina, and Kamilla Rakhimova performed together with Oksana Kalashnikova from Georgia.
The final participants confirmed their status as the third and fourth favorites. They were helped in part by the fact that the first two seeded pairs were eliminated in the first round, i.e. in the round of 16. Danilina and Khromacheva did not lose a single game in three matches, while Kalashnikova and Rakhimova lost only one set. Camilla also performed in singles, but there she failed to overcome the barrier of the quarterfinals.
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Of all the participants in the final, Danilina is the most successful in doubles. At this event, the former Russian and now Kazakh tennis player reached the final of the Australian Open in 2022, and at last year’s US Open she won in mixed doubles – the status of the TBS champion obliges her a lot. Danilina, the former tenth racket of the world, has won six WTA doubles titles in her career, the previous one just in July in Iasi, where her partner was the same Khromacheva. Irina, before winning that title together with Anna, won four WTA doubles tournaments. Kalashnikova and Rakhimova are slightly less successful in this form of tennis. Between them they had nine titles: Oksana won six, Camilla won three.
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Rakhimova and Kalashnikova quickly took the initiative in the match. They took the first four games, and Khromacheva and Danilina had only one game point in this segment, and even that was at the decisive point. Irina and Anna tried to catch up with their rivals who had fallen behind, but the chase failed. In the seventh game, at 1:5, Camilla and Oksana missed a triple set point, but in the eighth they served out the match without any problems: 6:2 in 29 minutes.
In the second set, Rakhimova and Kalashnikova came close to closing out the match in their favour. In the fifth game they broke, then confidently held serve and thanks to this they had the opportunity to serve for the match at 5:4. But they did not take a single point! The next two games were also won by Khromacheva and Danilina, and in the 12th game their opponents again lost serve to love, 7:5 in 43 minutes.
In the championship tie-break (up to 10 points), Khromacheva and Danilina had a big advantage. They did not lose any balls, but they themselves took three mini-breaks. After the score reached 9:3 in their favour (six match points!), Rakhimova and Kalashnikova made a desperate attempt to come back. They overcame four match points, but on the fifth Irina and Anna finished the match with a convincing victory: 2:6, 7:5, [10:7] in 1 hour 26 minutes.
It is worth noting that for Khromacheva this title was the most important of her career. Irina won her previous trophies at WTA-250 tournaments and now she won the 500 for the first time.
