Jelena Jankovic of Serbia lifts the trophy after winning the final match against Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia at the Italian Open tennis tournament in Rome yesterday.

ROME (Reuters):

Jelena Jankovic continued her impressive preparation for the French Open when she beat world number three Svetlana Kuznetsova 7-5, 6-1 in the final of the Italian Open yesterday.

The 22-year-old Serb, seeded three in Rome, was far too consistent for her Russian adversary, who made a series of unforced errors to lose eight of her 10 service games.

"It's an unbelievable win for me. I've got better and better through the week," said Jankovic, who will move up to fourth in the world when the new rankings are published today.

The title was Jankovic's third of 2007 and her second on clay following her victory at the prestigious Family Circle Cup in Charleston last month. It also capped a year of steady progress for the Serb, who came into last year's Rome tournament on the back of 10 successive defeats but reached the quarter-finals to start her climb up the world rankings.

"I almost thought of quitting tennis," she admitted. "But it was here that everything turned around. And now one year later I'm here holding the trophy and I'm number four in the world. It's amazing."

Kuznetsova had finished runner-up in three tournaments this year, including last week's claycourt German Open in Berlin and had not dropped a set on her way to the Rome final, but her hard-hitting baseline game was misfiring. Several times the second seed rallied herself into a winning position only to blast the shot that should have been a winner, long or wide.