Jasmine Paolini has won the Firenze Ladies Open, the WTA 125 challenger event played in Florence. The Italian occured to be the best player on the home soil, sealing the successful week for the local players, as 3 of them managed to reach out the semifinals stage. Paolini has advanced to the final after a tough battle against fellowcountry Lucia Bronzetti. The 4th seed prevailed in a three-setter, which ended up after 2:40 hours of play with a score 7-6(11) 2-6 6-2. The opening set was a highlight there, as Paolini gained a break advantage twice, but could not close it until the tiebreak, which ended up after long and tight battle wih a score 13-11 for the world's number 65 who needed 5 setpoints to take the opening one.
Taylor Townsend was another finalist, who needed to fight hard in the semis. The American played against Sara Errani and her victory in the Saturday's semifinal is quite a story. Errani took the opening set and was leading with a break in the second one. Townsend has needed to clear a danger in 9th game, while serving to stay alive in this match. Errani created a matchpoint there, but Townsend performed a crucial hold and turned this set over by winning 3 another game to force the decider. The experienced Italian has seemingly regrouped well after wasted chances from second set and started the third one on front foot, moving up into 3-0 lead with double break advantage. As it panned out, this significant gap was neither enough, because the American performed another comeback and tipped the scales in her favour, winning 4-6 7-5 7-5 after 2:46 hours of play.
The final was not as entertaining as both the semis matches, but the local fans could cheer for Jasmine Paolini who prevailed to take the title after winning 6-3 7-5 over Townsend, who was rated as a pre-match favorite with an odd 1.53. Despite that, the local favorite was a dominant force in both sets. The Italian started great by leading 5-1 and delivered the win in opening set with a score 6-3. Townsend managed to hold a serve till the score 5-5 in second set despite the pressure from Paolini who created a few breakpoints on the road. This was not enough though, as Paolini has finally broke her opponent in 11th game and served for the title in the following game, despite defending 3 breakpoints.
Both the finalists capitalize on their deep run in Florence, as the winner moves up 13 places to advance into 52th spot in the next WTA rankings. Taylor Townsend makes an massive improvement, as she gains 60 places due to this week's performance and also last week's impressive run in Rome, where she advanced into 3rd round of main draw despite starting from the qualies. The American will hope to keep the momentum, as she plays in the qualifying to Roland Garros from the start of next week.
