This Mutua Madrid Open’s first final, the women’s doubles, took place on the Manolo Santana centre court between the second and third best duos in the tournament, those of Gabriela Dabrowski  and Giuliana Olmos, and Desirae Krawczyk and Demi Schuurs, respectively.

Canada’s Gabriela Dabrowski was playing her third final on the Madrid clay, all with a different partner, and having lost the previous two. This time, with the Mexican Giuliana Olmos by her side, she earned her place in the final, where she faced her previous teammate (Demi Schuurs), by seeing off Ostapenko and Kichenok in the semis.

They were faced with the pair formed by US player Desirae Krawczyk and Holland’s Demi Schuurs, who won the title in Stuttgart a few weeks ago and en route to this final knocked out the first seeds, Sanders and Zang.

It was a typical clay first set, with a number of breaks and opportunities, which would be decided on the finer details, so fine, in fact, that it went to a tiebreak, despite the fact that Dabrowski-Olmos had a set point earlier. They failed to convert that one, but in the tiebreak they made no mistake, 1-7.

The second set also looked to be heading the way of the Canadian-Mexican, who broke their opponents in the first game. They maintained their lead until the eighth game, where they lost their serve, something they did again later to eventually lose the set 7-5. “I think the energy was a bit strange. I felt that we were very close to winning and that as they weren’t under pressure, they were more intense and that gave them confidence and they started to play better”, said Olmos.

The decider, a super-tiebreak, was replete with mini-breaks until 7-6, when Dabrowski and Olmos finally managed to shake off their challengers and claim the title, their first as a team. “It’s a relief, it’s great to finally win here. I played very well in the last few years and I’m very happy with our performance today. I don’t think I played my best tennis, but we played intelligently in the crucial moments”, said Dabrowski of finally picking up her first title in Spain.

Olmos and Dabrowski leave tomorrow for Rome to play in the WTA 1000 in the Italian capital, where they said they plan to celebrate with “pizza and ice cream”, as well as making the most of tonight to explore the city of Madrid, “we’d like to go out tonight, we’ve been very busy and we’d like to enjoy it a bit”.