By Erik Gudris | Sunday, March 2, 2014

 

Top seed Dominika Cibulkova overcame a tough fight from Christina McHale to win her first title of 2014 in Acapulco.

Photo Credit: Mextenis

Dominika Cibulkova made good on her top seeding by winning the Abierto Mexicano Telcel event in Acapulco on Saturday night.

American Christina McHale, playing in her first ever WTA final, put up a stern challenge though to the recent Australian Open finalist. Though Cibulkova would climb out to a 5-2 lead in the opening set, McHale rallied to force a tiebreak.

Cibulkova earned a quick mini break lead and used that to propel her to a 7-6(3) set.

McHale responded by jumping out to a 4-1 lead herself in the second set. Though McHale soon served for it at 5-3, Cibulkova broke back to within a game. But McHale would break Cibulkova in the next game to level the match.

An untimely double fault from McHale while down break point in the opening game of the final set again swung momentum back to Cibulkova. Cibulkova would soon serve for the title two times. Once at 5-2 and then again while up 5-4.

After three match points came and went, Cibulkova finally converted on her fourth one to secure the 7-6(3), 4-6, 6-4 win after almost three hours.

"I expected a really tough match and this was over my expectations. I have to say, it was an extremely tough match. Her defense was amazing today. We had so many long rallies and the match was so up and down, but I was fighting for every point and I'm really happy I could win this," Cibulkova said to WTA.com.

Acapulco is now the fourth career title for Cibulkova who is now projected to climb to No. 11 when the new WTA rankings appear on Monday.