A roller coaster finale! Krejcikova and Siniakova narrowly missed out on the defence, the $170,000 prize went to their opponents

The Czech duo Barbora Krejcikova and Katerina Siniakova did not defend their title at the Champions Tournament. Until the final it was a sovereign ride without losing a set. In Fort Worth, the Czechs were the biggest favourites. Siniakova is the world number one in doubles and Krejcikova is number four.

In the group, they first beat the pair Krwczykova/Schuursova 6: 4 and 6: 3, then the American pair Gauffová/Pegula 6: 2 and 6: 1.

The semi-final also ended 2: 0. the Ukrainian-Latvian pair Kichenokova/Ostapenko left the court after sets 7: 6 and 6: 2 in favour of the Czechs.

The final started rather tragically. The opponents were the pair of Kudermetova/Mertens. The top seeds were quickly down 0::4 and although the performance picked up towards the end, it was too late to turn things around and they lost 2::6 in the opening set.

The improved performance towards the end of the first set was carried over into the next part of the match. The second set was won by 6::4 and a super tiebreak to 10 points came next.

The Czech pair entered the tiebreak with a great start, immediately leading 4::1, then 7::2. But then came the break, which meant the loss of the whole final. The score got to 7::7, 9::9 and at the end of the match the scoreboard showed 9::11.

“Congratulations to our opponents, they had a great week. I am looking forward to another successful season next year and playing against each other in the finals more than once,” said Krejčíková in the post-match interview.

The net prize for winning the final was $170,000 for the winning pair. Krejcikova and Siniakova earned roughly $155,000 for the entire tournament for participating, winning their group matches and also winning their semifinal. The entire tournament, including the singles portion, had a $5,000,000 endowment.

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