LADYDRAGON.COM - Shahar Peer wins the Guandzhou Tournament in China

Sunday September 20, 2009

Shahar Peer wins the Guandzhou Tournament in China

No.57 Shahar Peer from Israel wins the Guandzhou Tournament by defeating No.85 Alberta Brianti in 2 sets 6-3, 6-4 om 1 hour and 28 minutes.

Peer, who was the No.5 seed, made it through to the final without losing a set - in fact, so did No.7 seed Brianti. But while Peer had played for several titles previously - she was 3-1 lifetime in finals coming in - Brianti had never been beyond the semifinals on Tour.

It is Shahar's 4th WTA titles and her first three titles came at Pattaya City, Prague and Istanbul in 2006. She was also runner-up once, to Venus Williams at Memphis in February 2007.

Brianti's best previous result on the Tour came at Portoroz earlier this summer, where she was a semifinalist, falling to world No.1 Dinara Safina. The 29-year-old Italian upset one seed, No.7 seed Ayumi Morita, en route to her first final.

Only one of the Top 4 seeds made their projected semifinal spots, that being No.3 seed Peng Shuai, who had to retire against Peer in that round due to a right wrist injury. No.2 seed Zheng Jie was a late withdrawal from the event due to a left wrist injury; Anabel Medina Garrigues and Katarina Srebotnik, seeded No.1 and No.4, lost in the second and first rounds, respectively.

Previous champions in Guangzhou were Li Na (2004), Yan Zi (2005), Anna Chakvetadze (2006), Virginie Razzano (2007) and Vera Zvonareva (2008). This was the sixth edition of the hardcourt event.