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Jessica Pegula says she couldn’t have asked for a better start to 2026 after beating Elina Svitolina in straight sets to win the Dubai Tennis Championships.<\/b><\/p>\n
American fourth seed Pegula had reached the semi-finals of the Brisbane International and Australian Open in January, before securing her first title of the year with a 6-2 6-4 win over Ukrainian seventh seed Svitolina in Dubai on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Pegula said her victory in the final – her 10th WTA title – was due after reaching seven successive semi-finals on the Tour.<\/p>\n
“I can’t ask for much more. The last six months I’ve been playing some really good tennis,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I made seven consecutive semi-finals and I was like, ‘You know what, a title would be nice, maybe it will happen this week’, and it did.”<\/p>\n
Pegula also admitted she “couldn’t have asked for a better birthday present”, with the world number five set to turn 32 on 24 February.<\/p>\n
Svitolina came into the match perhaps feeling the after-effects of beating Coco Gauff the previous day in an epic three-hour encounter<\/a>, as Pegula took control immediately.<\/p>\n Pegula sped into an early double break, and despite some resistance from Svitolina, went on to wrap up the first set as the Ukrainian went into the net.<\/p>\n In the second set, Pegula’s deep, angled hitting continued to force Svitolina, who triumphed in Dubai in 2017 and 2018, into mistakes.<\/p>\n Svitolina saved one championship point on serve, but was powerless to prevent defeat in the next game as Pegula sealed the title with an ace.<\/p>\n The win saw Pegula become the third American to win in Dubai after Lindsay Davenport and three-time champion Venus Williams.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n