Marta Kostyuk overcame Varvara Gracheva in the ATX Open final on Sunday to lift her first WTA Tour crown. Kostyuk won 6-3, 7-5 in 91 minutes. Gracheva got 66% of her first serves compared to 50% of the Ukrainian. The latter, however, won 65% of the points on her first serve and 51% of the points on Gracheva’s first serve return.
Both opponents struggled to get it right on their second serves. Gracheva won 33% of her second serve points, while Kostyuk won 26%. Kostyuk generated 15 break points on Gracheva’s serve and served seven of them. However, he failed to save five of the six break points he faced.
Kostyuk earned 69 points in the match, six more than his opponent’s 63.
ATX Open: Marta Kostyuk ends her nascent wait for cutlery
After the win, the 20-year-old shared: “Very surreal. He was just playing match by match, and I think that’s how you win tournaments, I guess!
It’s not so easy to talk right now, but I’m obviously extremely happy. I’m happy to be healthy and happy to play tennis and see the crowd enjoy my game.» Following this loss, Gracheva now trails Kostyuk 2-4 in their rivalry.
Like Kostyuk, the 22-year-old was also looking to win the first WTA title of her career. On Monday, both players’ ratings received a significant boost. While Gracheva was ranked 88th last week, she is now up 22 places to 66th.
She is also seven places into her career from no. 59 in the world which she reached in July 2022. Meanwhile, Kostyuk set a new career high for her as world number one. 40. In addition to winning her first WTA event, Marta Kostyuk also posted other milestones at the ATX Open.
This was also the first WTA final for the Ukrainian, who had previously been beaten in all four of the semifinals she had previously played. Photo Credit: WTA Twitter
