Halep, Muguruza cruise into Cincinnati final

Romania's Simona Halep brushed aside American Sloane Stephens 6-2, 6-1 to advance to the final of the Western & Southern Open here on Saturday.

The second seed, Halep, who had reached the semifinals of this hard-court tennis event for the third straight year, showed her superiority from the baseline by completely dominating the second-serve points, reports Efe.

Halep won 91 percent (10 out of 11) of those points in her service games and 83 percent (10 out of 12) on return.

In Sunday's final, she will take on the fourth-seeded Muguruza who claimed a surprisingly easy 6-3, 6-2 win over Czech top seed and world No. 1 Karolina Pliskova in Saturday's first semifinal.

Halep will become World No.1 for the first time if she can defeat Muguruza to capture her maiden title in Cincinnati.

Muguruza narrowly avoided defeat in a third-round 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (7-3) victory on Thursday over American Madison Keys and needed two hours and 45 minutes to get past Russia's Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-2, 5-7, 7-5 in Friday's quarterfinals.

But she was nearly flawless on Saturday, not losing her serve once and breaking Pliskova four times.

--IANS

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