Halep confidence at all-time high after clinching Doha title

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  • Triumphant: Halep (r) heads to Dubai off the back of victory in Doha.

    Simona Halep believes her confidence is at an all-time high after the young Romanian captured her biggest title to date, cruising past Angelique Kerber 6-2, 6-3 to win the title at the Premier 5-level tournament in Doha.

    Halep, a former junior world No1, has now won seven titles in the past nine months, and the 22-year-old is hoping to achieve bigger things on bigger stages.

    “I think I can play at a higher level now. I believe in my chance. I believe in my game,” said Halep after her win. “Mentally I am strong. I feel confident on the court. Now I want just to think about my game and to think maybe if it's possible to make semi-finals at Grand Slams. I know that will be very tough, but I will work hard for that.”

    The No7 seed almost crashed out of the tournament in her first match against Kaia Kanepi, who was leading Halep 5-3 in the final set before the Romanian came back to win in the tiebreak.

    “I called my coach on court. I told him ‘it's over, I lost the match’” revealed Halep. “But he said that I can win and then, after that match, I was very confident with my serve. I believed that I had my chance here in this tournament. I was fighting for every point and just tried to find my game again.”

    And that confidence showed from the very start of Sunday's final as Halep first took advantage of a double fault to break Kerber to love in the opening game, before breaking again with a sharp-angled cross court winner that drew the error from the German to cruise ahead 4-1.

    Serving for the set in the eighth game, Halep had to save three break points before taking a one-set lead thanks to a netted backhand from Kerber on her second set point.

    Kerber had a talk with her coach Benjamin Ebrahimizade between sets, burying her face in a towel and desperately trying to regroup, and she stepped on the court to hold comfortably in the opening game of the second set.

    Halep had to save a break point to hold for 1-1 and just when it looked like Kerber was finding her shots and setting up net approaches nicely, the German was broken in the fifth game on a backhand volley winner from her diminutive opponent.

    Kerber upped the pressure on Halep in game eight, but the Romanian came up with a fearless down the line forehand winner at 30-30, that clipped the line to give her a game point, and she held for a 5-3 lead with a service winner.

    Serving to stay in the match, Kerber hit a down the line backhand wide to give Halep her first championship point and the German let nerves take over, double-faulting to hand over the trophy to her opponent.

    “I can’t believe that I won this tournament because I was coming from indoors, playing Fed Cup, so I’m really happy and I have to enjoy this moment because it’s the best moment of my life,” said Halep, who will move up one spot to No9 in the rankings today.

    “It’s the highest confidence I have in myself.”

    Kerber, who will be ranked No8 today, was still happy with her week despite suffering a second final lost of the season.

    “I think I was trying to play what I could today, and I think I made too many mistakes at the beginning of the match and made too many easy ones, but I think Simona was playing very well.

    "She played the whole week on a high level. I think she deserved to win the title. I give everything I could and I'm still happy about the week,” said Kerber, who lost the final in Sydney earlier this year.

    Both Halep and Kerber have arrived in Dubai today. Halep opens her campaign in the UAE against Alize Cornet while Kerber faces Ana Ivanovic.

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