In the final of Kinoshita Group Japan Open Tennis Championships 2023 held on the 17th, a non-seeded player, Ashlyn Krueger defeated the first seed, Zhu Lin with a score of 6-3,7-6 (6). This was her first tour final and thus her first WTA tour title. She unleashed powerful forehands and backhands aiming precisely and overpowered Zhu Lin, ranked 35th in the world. Krueger had been serving well from the beginning of the tournament and today was no exception. When she was not hitting her 7 aces, her powerful serves got less than ideal returns from Zhu which Krueger put away not allowing any break points to her opponent.

In the second set tiebreaker, she lost a point on her serve at 5-5. That gave her opponent a set point but she remained calm and drew out a mistake from Zhu. She showed no sign of her nerves, continued to swing her racquet freely, scored two consecutive points and won the match.

“I was able to play aggressively because I was serving really well,” she said. Ashlyn’s goal was to be in the top 100 and that has been achieved. With the points she earned she will achieve that goal in the world ranking that will be updated on the 18th.

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