Washington: Argentina's injury-plagued David Nalbandian won his first ATP title since January of last year by defeating eighth seed Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus 6-2, 7-6 (7/4) in Sunday's Washington Classic final.
The former world number three took the 281,500-dollar top prize from the 1.4 million-dollar hardcourt event, a tuneup for the US Open that starts in three weeks, after winning the first US final either player had ever contested.
Nalbandian was sidelined nine months after hip surgery, made a brief return early this year, then missed two months with a sore hamstring before coming back in July to help Argentina reach the Davis Cup semi-finals.
He captured his 11th career crown in his first final since winning the title at Sydney 19 months ago.
The 28-year-old South American has missed the past six Grand Slams and had not played an ATP event since April.
At 117th in the world, Nalbandian is the lowest-ranked player to win an ATP title this year, a feat that will lift him back into the top 45.
Nalbandian broke at love to open the match and again in the penultimate game of the set, Baghdatis taking only 4-of-13 points off his second serves.
Back-to-back double faults by Nalbandian gave Baghdatis a break and a 2-0 lead to start the second set, but the big-hitting Argentine answered by breaking Baghdatis on his third opportunity of the next game.
Nalbandian saved four break points before holding in the fourth game and took a 3-2 lead with a break in the next game when his video replay appeal ruled a Baghdatis backhand wide.
The Cypriot answered with a forehand winner to break back and then held but was denied on two break points by Nalbandian, who held to 4-4.
Nalbandian faced a break and set point on his serve in the 12th game but saved it when Baghdatis netted a backhand and held to force a tie-breaker, then rolled to a 5-0 lead on his way to winning after two hours.
Baghdatis, 25, failed in a bid for his fifth career ATP title, the most recent of them last January at Sydney. The 25th-ranked Cypriot will move to 21st after a 2009 rankings slide from the top 150 with wrist and back injuries.
Nalbandian lost three of four prior matches with Baghdatis, including a 2006 Australian Open semi-final and their most recent meeting in the third round at Wimbledon in 2007.
Nalbandian continued a run of Argentine champions in the US capital after reigning US Open champion Juan Martin Del Potro's titles in 2008 and 2009. Del Potro was unable to seek a third consecutive crown due to injury.
The former world number three took the 281,500-dollar top prize from the 1.4 million-dollar hardcourt event, a tuneup for the US Open that starts in three weeks, after winning the first US final either player had ever contested.
Nalbandian was sidelined nine months after hip surgery, made a brief return early this year, then missed two months with a sore hamstring before coming back in July to help Argentina reach the Davis Cup semi-finals.
The 28-year-old South American has missed the past six Grand Slams and had not played an ATP event since April.
Advertisement
Nalbandian broke at love to open the match and again in the penultimate game of the set, Baghdatis taking only 4-of-13 points off his second serves.
Advertisement
Nalbandian saved four break points before holding in the fourth game and took a 3-2 lead with a break in the next game when his video replay appeal ruled a Baghdatis backhand wide.
Advertisement
Nalbandian faced a break and set point on his serve in the 12th game but saved it when Baghdatis netted a backhand and held to force a tie-breaker, then rolled to a 5-0 lead on his way to winning after two hours.
Advertisement
Nalbandian lost three of four prior matches with Baghdatis, including a 2006 Australian Open semi-final and their most recent meeting in the third round at Wimbledon in 2007.
Advertisement
COMMENTS
Advertisement
When Good is Better than Great, and Interesting Beats Impressive US Open: Message Received as Marcos Baghdatis Warned For Using Cellphone David Nalbandian Honing Skills at Rally Races Windows Computers Lead To 'Blue Screen Of Death' Due To CrowdStrike Error In 1st Statement After Outage, CrowdStrike CEO Says... How World Scrambled To Deal With One Of The Biggest IT Crashes: 10 Points Microsoft Power Outage Caused "Minor Disruptions" In 10 Banks: RBI Doctor Who Saved Man By Giving CPR: "We Are Only God's Representatives'' 10 Additional Delhi, Bombay High Court Judges Made Permanent Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.