On the back of her season ending victory at the Kremlin Cup, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova exclusively told GiveMeSport about the difficulty of the final and her emotions about the home win.
The Russian saw off Romania's Irina-Camelia Begu 6-4 5-7 6-1 in the final of the tournament in front of her home crowd in Moscow to claim her seventh career title.
The 23-year-old came through the three set final in two hours 28 minutes, and was showing signs of fatigue after losing the second set to Begu.
"I'm so happy and proud of winning it in front of my home crowd, friends and family," she said.
"It was tough mentally and physically. It hasn't been an easy year for me, but I did it! I think I'm the first russian to do it since 2007.
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"I was extremely tired, but calm at the same time. I knew it was the last set of this season and I just knew I've had to give my all and play my aggressive tennis from the first point to the last!"
"So I just focused on myself [in the final set] as I was a bit more emotional in the second set and wasn't thinking about what I was doing."
Pavlyuchenkova took a swift 5-0 lead in the last, eventually coming out a 6-1 winner to claim her second title of the campaign and follow in the footsteps of previous Russian Kremlin Cup winners Anastasia Myskina, Anna Chekvetadze and Elena Dementieva, to which she added:
"That's... Wow! It's like a dream come true! I have been following that tournament since I was very little. Its not an easy tournament to play for a Russian player."
Pavlyuchenkova now begins her pre season preparations in an attempt to be ready for the Australian Open in January.
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