Garbine Muguruza battles past Aryna Sabalenka at the Qatar Open

Garbine Muguruza overcame a mid-match resurgence from Aryna Sabalaneka to knock out the title defender at the Qatar Open.

The opening set was dominated by Muguruza as she managed to turn Sabalenka's game against her. As always, Sabalenka played very aggressive style but Muguruza handled that initial pressure well frustrating Aryna. A direct consequence was her making a lot of mistakes that gave Muguruza the lead which she conveyed into a 6-2 opening set victory. The 2nd set was much more competitive despite Muguruza taking a 2-0 lead. After that, her level dropped substantially which gave Sabalenka a chance to come back into the match which she did.

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Muguruza continued to struggle with Sabalenka taking the 5-3 lead and setting up a chance to serve for the 2nd set. She failed to win the game and Muguruza came back into the match with momentum swinging her way. She would go on to break Sabalenka and take a 6-5 lead coming only one service game away from winning the match. Aryna came back with a strong game forcing the tiebreak in which she ultimately prevailed 7-5 sending the match into a deciding set.

In the deciding set there was a lot of excitement as both players had to save break points early in order to stay in the match. Sabalenka struck first as she took a 3-2 lead after breaking Muguruza. After a very long game Muguruza managed to pull it back to make it 3-3. After that Sabalenka completely collapsed losing 3 games in in a row to lose the match.

All in all a very good display from Muguruza who managed to endure several pushes from Sabalenka to knock out the 2020 Champion.

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Strong performance from the 🇪🇸 @GarbiMuguruza takes out the defending champion Sabalenka, 6-2, 6-7(5), 6-3. #QatarTotalOpen2021

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