Venus Williams Ends 2008 Tennis Season with Sony Ericsson Championships Title

Venus Williams closed the book on the 2008 Sony Ericsson WTA Tour tennis season by winning the season-ending Championships title on Sunday.

The 2008 Wimbledon champion defeated Vera Zvonareva in the final match of the year in Doha, Qatar.

Williams won her first Sony Ericsson Championships title in three sets 6-7(5), 6-0, 6-2. She is the first American to win the title since her sister Serena took the title in 2001.

“It’s a fantastic feeling to end the season this way,” Williams said after winning her 39th career Sony Ericsson WTA Tour singles title and third of 2008, having previously won Wimbledon and Zurich.

Williams went undefeated throughout the week, defeating the world’s Top 3 en route to the title, No.1 Jankovic in SF and No.2 Safina and No.3 S.Williams in earlier round robin play (she also defeated No.5 Dementieva in the round robin portion).

“I haven’t had the opportunity to play this tournament very often, so it’s really awesome to have the opportunity to play here and play well, too. I haven’t thought too much about next year yet, but I have high and wonderful hopes for it, and at the appropriate time I’ll start working hard again.”

Vera Zvonareva was appearing in her biggest-ever singles final, having gone undefeated coming into the final (as did Williams), defeating world No.4 Ivanovic, No.7 Svetlana Kuznetsova and No.1 Jelena Jankovic (second career win over a reigning No.1) in round robin play and No.5 Dementieva in SF, marking the first time in her career to defeat three Top 5 players in the same event.

“It’s the first time I’ve got the chance to play against Top 10 players five matches in a row,” Zvonareva said. “And I was able to come up with four wins. So, of course, it’s a good week. I think I could have done a bit better today, played a little bit better tennis. But, overall, I’m going to try to analyze and try to be better next time.”

By winning $1,340,000 (having gone undefeated this week), Williams jumps from 5th to 2nd on the all-time money list with US$21,921,346, behind only Lindsay Davenport ($22,144,735).