Tuesday, 31 October, 2006

Top seed Maria Sharapova stormed to her fifth title of the year with a straight-sets victory over defending champion Nadia Petrova in the Generali Ladies championship in Austria on Sunday.

Sharapova needed just one hour 15 minutes to wrap up the 7-5 6-2 victory and take her record against the world number five to five wins and just one loss.

But the world's third best player, who has now won 16 straight matches including her US Open triumph in September, had to wait until the 11th game of the first set before making the breakthrough.

Serving at 6-5, the 19-year-old then breezed through the next four points to take the first set.

She broke a further two times in the second set and wrapped up her most convincing victory from six encounters against her compatriot.

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