Erin Routliffe and Gaby Dabrowski have always had really close battles with the world’s top-ranked doubles pair, Katerina Siniakova and Taylor Townsend, and there was no reason to think that their round-robin match at the WTA Tour Finals would be any different. Routliffe held comfortably to start before being aced out wide by Townsend, with the left-handed American adding a fabulous backhand winner into the left tramline as she went on to hold in turn.
Dabrowski held to love, Routliffe winning the second point with a beautiful backhand volley before hitting a beautiful inside-out backhand return off Siniakova. The Czech then dumped a backhand into the net to give away the first deuce in the match, but Routliffe’s inside-out backhand return of the deciding point thudded into the net. She and Townsend held safely again, but that took them to the most dramatic game of the afternoon.
Usually there’s a mixture of winners and errors when a game is lost, but that wasn’t the case when Dabrowski got broken to love in her second service game. Two terrific winners each from Townsend and Siniakova blew that truism sky-high, starting with a beautiful forehand return down the tramlines from the left-hander and a gorgeous backhand return down the tramlines form her partner. Townsend added a lovely cross-court backhand lob into the end of the tramlines to give her team break points, and Siniakova completed the game with a beautiful backhand volley which went down the tramlines as well.
Siniakova then held to consolidate the break, despite a beautiful backhand winner down the line from Dabrowski, but in Routliffe’s next game she lost the best rally of the match after 12 shots by hitting a forehand over the baseline. The New Zealander went on to hold her serve, but it still left Townsend aiming to close out the set. Routliffe started with a beautiful backhand return down the tramlines before Siniakova gave her team set points by hitting a beautiful cross-court backhand volley. Routliffe lost the first of those when she hit a forehand into the net, and the set was at an end after 38 minutes.
There was far less action in the second set, with most games just featuring a mix of random winners and errors after Routliffe and Townsend started with easy holds. Townsend hit a huge cross-court backhand winner off Dabrowski to win the Canadian’s first point, and it was somewhat surprising to see that it was Siniakova who cracked first. Townsend and Dabrowski started with unforced errors, but the world number one hit three of her own to give away the game.
Routliffe hit a beautiful inside-out backhand volley to end a great rally on the way to holding to love, with Townsend’s double fault in the next game more than outweighed by four unforced errors from the other side of the net. Dabrowski held to love to leave Siniakova serving to stay in the set, but she aced Routliffe three times on the way to doing just that.
The New Zealander was now trying to serve out, but she was forced into a forehand error on the first point before Siniakova hit the shot of the match, a fantastic cross-court backhand return which the HawkEye replay showed had caught literally one millimetre of the sideline. A forehand into the net from Routliffe gave away break points, and Townsend converted the first of those with a fabulous cross-court backhand return of a second serve.
Townsend did lose a couple of points on the way to holding serve to level the scores, but Dabrowski hit a beautiful soft angled forehand winner into the tramlines to finish another great rally and hold to love for the third time in a row. Now the pressure went back on Siniakova, but she lost only a double fault before acing Routliffe out wide to take them to a tie-break. It started badly for the defending champions when Dabrowski was forced to hit a cross-court backhand volley wide to lose the first point, but Townsend double faulted to cancel out that mini-break.
Routliffe was then forced to hit a backhand volley into the net to give the advantage back to the second seeds, and she lost the second of her next pair of serves when Dabrowski hit a forehand volley into the net. That gave away three match points, and Dabrowski gifted the match to Siniakova and Townsend by hammering her forehand return of serve way over the baseline. The final score was 6-4, 7-6 (3), and the match had lasted for an hour and 31 minutes.