Guwahati: Sania Mirza’s illustrious career came to an end on Tuesday as she defeated in the first round of the Dubai Tennis Championships.
The tennis player and American Madison Keys lost their women’s doubles match against Viktoria Kudermetova and Liudmila Samsonova 4-6, 0-6.
The first set finished in a 3-3 deadlock between the two teams after a competitive start to the match. The Kudermetova-Samsonova combination broke Sania’s serve first in the seventh game, but the Indo-American team swiftly responded with their own break in the following game.
However, the Kudermetova-Samsonova combination maintained service in the tenth game to take a 1-0 lead after Keys, the world’s No. 23 singles player, was unable to do so in the ninth.
Sania and Keys were defeated in the second set by Veronika Kudermetova and Liudmila Samsonova, who went on to win the match in just over an hour.
Sania Mirza will retire after the WTA 1000 tournament in Dubai, as she has stated. She retires as the greatest women’s tennis player in Indian history despite a disappointing end to her career.
In her career, the six-time Grand Slam champion has won 44 WTA titles, only one of which was in singles. She most recently won a doubles match in the Czech Republic’s Ostrava Open2021 with Zhang Shuai.
Six Grand Slam winners’ medals can be found in Mirza’s trophy cabinet, which is frequently regarded as the gold standard of a great tennis player’s pro career accomplishments.
Her first victory came in 2009 when she teamed up with Mahesh Bhupathi to win the Australian Open mixed doubles championship. Mirza and Bhupathi teamed up once more to make India proud three years later on the revered clay of Roland Garros.
She won her third mixed doubles championship in a Slam when she teamed up with Brazilian player Bruno Soares at the 2014 US Open. Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis, a Swiss legend, won three consecutive Grand Slam doubles championships in 2015.
Sania Mirza also received the Arjuna Award in 2004, the Padma Shri Award in 2006, the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award in 2015, and the Padma Bhushan in 2016.