Kafelnikov’s countryman, Mikhail Youzhny, has won the Valencia Open tennis tournament by defeating the local boy David Ferrer in the final match. Youzhny won the match in the straight sets by 6-3, 7-5.
Nobody was expecting this result. Ferrer was playing in front of his home crowd and he was the higher ranked player as well. So, he was the clear favourite, but, Youzhny surprised everybody by outplaying his 31 years old opponent. The Russian player dominated right through and ended up winning the 10th singles title of his career.
In the post match interview, Youzhny said, “The last few days have been fantastic for me. I am very happy with my performance in this tournament.”
“The crowd here was superb. They were obviously supporting David, but, whenever a good shot came off my racquet, they praised that and that was really nice of them.”
This is the second time in the ongoing season that Youzhny has won a singles title. Before this, he had won the Swiss Open which was played at Gstaad in July.
For Ferrer, it was a disappointing day. He was expected to lift the trophy for the 4th time here at Valencia, but, he couldn’t do that. This was his 6th successive defeat in the final matches.
Talking to the reporters after the match, Ferrer said, “It’s obviously gutting to get beaten in front of the home crowd. I couldn’t play with that much intensity today. I got a lot of opportunities especially in the second set, but, I couldn’t capitalize.”
“Mikhail served fantastically well throughout the match and I want to congratulate him for winning the title.”
Mikhail Youzhny had reached the title round in Valencia in 2009 as well, but, he had got beaten by Andy Murray.