Maria Sharapova kept her poise to outwit and outpower diminutive Italian Sara Errani and win her first French Open with a 6-3 6-2 victory on Saturday.
Despite the one-sided scoreline, Italian Errani troubled Sharapova with some cute volleys, sliced forehands, daring dropshots but still found the Russian to be an insurmountable obstacle.
With Errani standing at just 1.64 metres, the statuesque Russian used her 24 cms advantage and wider wingspan to great effect as she chased down everything the Italian could throw at her.
She wrapped up victory when Errani ended a prolonged rally by dumping a backhand into the net, allowing Sharapova to become the 10th woman to complete a career grand slam after she added the Paris title to her triumphs at Wimbledon (2004), the U.S. Open (2006) and the Australian Open (2008).
(Reporting by Pritha Sarkar, editing by John Mehaffey)
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