Simona Halep becomes world number two with Bucharest win

Halep won her eighth singles title on Sunday (©GettyImages).

Simona Halep has moved into second place in the world rankings, after defeating Italy’s Roberta Vinci 6-1, 6-3 in the final of the Bucharest Open.

The Romanian won her eighth singles title, and her first on home soil, after completing a comfortable victory in 68 minutes over the Italian.

World number two

Victory in front of her home crowd will see Halep displace China's Li Na as the new world number two when the WTA rankings get released later today.

This year’s French Open finalist romped to a comfortable first set win, and despite falling an early break of serve behind to her 31-year-old opponent in the second set, Halep fought back from 0-2 down to win six of the next seven games and win her third singles title on clay.

The match was the sixth meeting between the two players, with Halep holding a 4-2 advantage over the world number 24 in their head-to-head meetings.

Rise up the rankings

The 22-year-old has achieved a meteoric rise through the rankings since May last year, as at that time she was ranked at 64, but by the end of 2013 her ranking had risen to 11.

Her consistency on the tour continued, after winning her first six singles titles in 2013, she has followed that up with runs to the final of the French Open in June and the semi-finals at Wimbledon earlier in July.

Good showing in the Grand Slams

Halep began the year with her first run to the quarter-finals of the Australian Open in January, followed by a victory in the final of the Qatar Total Open in Doha in February over Germany’s Angelique Kerber.

She is still yet to reach the peak age of her career, and despite losing to Maria Sharapova in the final at Roland Garros and being beaten by Canada’s Eugenie Bouchard at SW19, Halep has shown her credentials to become the first Romanian to win a Grand Slam since Virginia Ruzici in 1978.

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Vinci’s defeat means that she is still yet to win a singles title in 2014, and she missed out on winning a 10th career singles title.

Simona Halep inside info

The former world number 11 has not enjoyed a similar run of form to Halep, as she had lost her previous four matches before the start of the tournament, and her ranking has dropped by 11 places since the start of the year.

In the other WTA Tour event, Germany's Andrea Petkovic won her fourth Tour title at Bad-Gastein, when she defeated American Shelby Rogers 6-3, 6-3 in the final.