Garbine Muguruza eyes title defence at Dubai Tennis Championships

Garbine Mugurza won the 2021 Dubai Tennis Championships and the Spaniard is eyeing another trophy this year wanting to put the Australian disappointment after her.

The Spanish two-time major champion was ranked 16 in the world last year when she arrived in Dubai. Her last title came nearly two years before that with the Spaniard desperate for a good result. A week later, Muguruza was hoisting Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships' shiny ‘coffee pot’ trophy, celebrating an impressive victory over Barbora Krejcikova in the final, and scooping her biggest title since 2017.

A year later, Muguruza is in the same place remembering:

“It meant a lot. It was such a weird tournament; coming last minute from Doha, without a team – well, without part of my team, playing so many matches in a row. I think it was a hell of an experience. But it was good, gave me a lot of confidence in myself.”

Muguruza is hopeful ahead of the event wanting to put Australia behing her:

“I was disappointed. It took a couple of days back home [to get over it]. I'm like, ‘Okay, how I'm going to shake things up? How I'm going to come back stronger?’ We started training pretty fast, a lot kind of just to put the work, feel like, ‘Okay, I'm going to prepare better’. It’s always disappointing to lose in a Grand Slam that early. But I moved on. I'm here. This is a good tournament. It's in the past already.”