A day after Marion Bartoli stunned Sabine Lisicki to win the Wimbledon ladies' crown, another Frenchwoman achieved her Grand Slam dream. Kristina Mladenovic, one of the hottest prospects of the young generation, teamed up with doubles legend, Canadian Daniel Nestor, to win the mixed-doubles trophy, following a nail-biting 5-7,6-2,8-6 final victory over American Lisa Raymond and Brazilian Bruno Soares.
Mladenovic has been in great form in the doubles this year, collecting three titles with three different partners: Memphis with Galina Voskoboeva, Charleston with Lucie Safarova, respectively Oeiras with Hao-Ching Chan. The Frenchwoman also finished runner-up with Daniel Nestor at the French Open, where they lost 10-4 in the super-tiebreak to Czech duo Lucie Hradecka and Frantisek Cermak.
The victory at Wimbledon comes to revenge for their Roland Garros disappointment, but the pair had to overcome some tough challenges en route to clinching the title. They dismissed the second seeded Sania Mirza and Horia Tecau in the quarterfinal, third seeded Katarina Strebotnik and Nenad Zimonjic in the semis, and now the No.1 seeded Raymond and Soares.
I put great faith in Kristina. She has a huge game, powerful groundstrokes, booming serve, but most important, she's proven she is extremely tough mentally. With her team in danger of losing a second consecutive major final, she saved two match points on her serve to level at 6 all in the decider. The French-Canadian tandem then broke decisively in the next game, while the experienced Nestor served out a superb win to the delight of Marion Bartoli and her dad, Walter, who were cheering from the crowd.
photo: GETTY IMAGES
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