Zimbabwe's player Cara Black and her American partner Liezel Huber have tightened their grip at the top of the world's women's tennis doubles rankings after clinching the Barclays Dubai Championships title in the United Arab Emirates on Saturday.
Black and Huber, who are currently ranked as the joint world number ones, have extended their lead at the top of the world doubles rankings by more than 1,000 points, Wednesday's The Herald reported.
According to the latest Sony Ericsson WTA Tour Doubles Rankings, which were released Tuesday in New York, Black and Huber are sitting pretty at the top of the standings with 4,885 points.
This came after they successfully defended their Dubai Championships title by defeating the Chinese pair of Yan Zi and Zheng Jie 7-5, 6-2 in the final on Saturday for their second doubles crown of the year.
By winning in Dubai, Black and Huber collected 300 WTA Tour championship points which has seen them both taking a healthy lead of 1,145 points over their nearest rival Katarina Srebotnik of Slovenia who is lying in third place in the world rankings with 3,740 points.
Srebotnik's partner Ai Sugiyama of Japan is in fourth place with 3,655 points.
Black and Huber are also closing in on the Bondarenko sisters, Alona and Kateryna, of Ukraine at the top of the Sony Ericsson Championships Team Standings.
Placed second in the Team Standings, Black and Huber, with 1,286 points, are now only 114 points behind the Bondarenko sisters who are leading in the race with 1,400 points.
Yan and Zheng are in third place with 1,105 points.
Black and Huber's bank accounts are also swelling by the day. The Zimbabwean-American duo picked up a cheque for 80,000 U.S. dollars for clinching the Dubai Championships doubles title on Saturday.
And according to the latest WTA Tour Prize Money List for 2008,which was also released Tuesday, Black, in 27th place, is slowly gaining ground among the tour's top money earners as she has now amassed a total of US$121,682 on the road this year.
In Saturday's final in Dubai, Black and Huber stamped their authority early on when they broke serve in just the third game.
Despite a flurry of service breaks, the Zimbabwean-American duo managed to stretch their lead to 5-3 and eventually closed it out when a Zheng forehand return sailed wide on their third set point.
Source: Xinhua
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