Sunday 14 February 2016 17:43, UK
Roberta Vinci snapped a losing streak in finals to beat top-seeded Belinda Bencic 6-4 6-3 and take the inaugural St Petersburg Ladies Trophy on Sunday.
Victory gave Vinci her 10th career singles title on the WTA Tour and ended her 0-4 streak in finals dating back to 2013 including last year's US Open, where she lost to fellow Italian Flavia Pennetta.
A to-and-fro first set between the tournament's top two seeds saw Vinci broken twice as she landed just 51 per cent of her first serves, but she responded with three breaks of her own.
Vinci then held serve throughout the second and broke her 18-year-old Swiss opponent once to take the win in one hour, 19 minutes. Vinci dropped just one set in the tournament, against Serbia's Ana Ivanovic in the quarter-finals.
Despite her defeat in the final, the 11th-ranked Bencic is set to rise into the WTA top 10 for the first time Monday.
Earlier, the top-seeded pair of Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza stretched their unbeaten run to 40 matches after cruising to a 6-3 6-1 over Vera Dushevina and Barbora Krejcikova in the doubles final.
