World No. 1, Angelique Kerber of Germany and the other WTA Finals debutant, Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia took the stage for the second round-robin match in Singapore today.

Kerber started off well in the first set, breaking Cibulkova’s serve, but once Cibulkova had settled down and following a focused chat with her coach, Matej Liptak during one of the changeovers, she upped the level of her game with a brilliant mix of shots, forcing a tie-break, which Kerber was lucky to win.

The second set belonged to Cibulkova, who managed to win 75% of her first serve points. Kerber managed to avoid a bagel when she held her own serve and broke Cibulkova’s serve. The pressure seemed to be on the World No. 1.

Commentator, Alicia Molik, remarked that Kerber seemed quite reserved and needed to find the emotions that have pulled her through in her matches.

Enter the third set and the Cibulkova barrage continued, but along with it, fatigue started setting in and Kerber, who seemed to find her emotions, lifted her game and started capitalising on Cibulkova’s mistakes, breaking her service game twice and advancing the winner. The final score was 7-6(5) 2-6 6-3 in a match that lasted 2 hours 17 minutes.

This was undoubtedly one of the best matches of the 2016 season so far and has certainly set the tone for the remainder of the WTA Finals in Singapore.

Image courtesy of the WTA