The highest title in her career. The famous Ukrainian tennis player, losing 1:5, defeated the 5th world racket and reached the final

Ukraine's third ranked player Marta Kostiuk (WTA No. 34) won a hard-fought victory at the WTA 500 tournament in San Diego (USA) with a prize pool of $900,000. In the semifinals, the 21-year-old from Kyiv defeated American Jessica Pegula (WTA No. 5) 6:7 (4:7), 1:6 in an hour and a half.

The match was not going well for our compatriot. The 30-year-old New York native literally crushed the Ukrainian, easily taking the first five games out of six. Losing 1-5, Kostyuk relaxed and made a fantastic break.

Marta managed to bring the set to a tiebreak, which she won with a score of 7:4.

Pegula had neither the moral nor the physical strength for the second game. Crushed by the loss, the US tennis player gave up, allowing her Ukrainian opponent to win with a crushing 6-1 score.

Commenting on her success, Marta Kostiuk said that she did not know what happened to her in the first set and how she was able to turn the tide of the match.

"As I said, I lost to Jessica very easily in the previous match. I was disappointed that today everything was going in the same direction... I don't even know how I changed everything. I'm sorry, guys. I tried to think of an answer, but I don't know," the Ukrainian said with a smile.

Marta Kostiuk played against Jessica Pegula for the third time and managed to defeat her for the first time. This is the first victory against a top-5 tennis player.

Kostiuk will play in the WTA Finals for the second time in her career and for the first time at the 500 level. Marta will compete for the biggest title of her career against the 49th ranked Katie Boulter from Great Britain. The tournament starts on March 4 at 01:00 Kyiv time.

As OBOZ.UA previously reported, Kostiuk defeated neutral athlete Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (WTA No. 25) 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the quarterfinals in two hours and 14 minutes.

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