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It was a Russian Revolution in London as Nikolay Davydenko captured the biggest title of his career winning the ATP World Tour Finals beating Juan Martin del Potro in straight sets 6-3, 6-4 at the O2 Arena. Kolya, as he is known in tennis circles, outplayed a strangely lacklustre Del Potro with his usual brand of aggressive baseline tennis, taking the ball early and dictating points. Davydenko, justified his nickname as the ‘Iron man', looking as fresh as a daisy despite his exertions over the week. Del P otro in comparison was clearly fatigued & out-of-sorts and never looked to be in with a shout as the match petered out without ever threatening to resemble a classic. The title capped a wonderful week for Nikolay, a week in which he beat all four Grand Slam winners of the year - Federer, Nadal & Del Potro - to become the first Russian to take the Year Ending Championships.

Nikolay was self-effacing in his post match interview. "For me it was amazing, coming in as number seven and winning the tournament. I surprised myself." With his performances this week, he shouldn't be.

Davydenko over the course of this tournament has come racing out of the blocks evinced especially in his matches against Federer in the semis & Nadal earlier in the round robin stage. He did the same today too, taking his groundstrokes early, hitting them from corner to corner and ghosting in for the finishing volley. Del Potro has a naturally ursine countenance and in the early stages resembled an especially morose, lumbering grizzly. Although he served well, he just wasn't hitting his shots cleanly and his movement looked laboured relative to the sprightly, almost hare-like Nikolay. Kolya got the early break, went up 4-1, and held on from there to take the set 6-3 in under 40 minutes.

Things got a trifle better for the US Open champ in the second, as he started hitting the ball better rushing Davydenko occasionally and even forcing a breakpoint. But it was still a struggle as he was forced to come up with monstrous serves to stave off break points on his own delivery. The struggle seemed to help though as he began to extend his opponent on his serve without quite managing to finish the job. Come crunch time in the 9th game, Davydenko stepped it up and Del Potro slipped a notch. The Russian played a top quality return game to break an unfamiliarly insipid Del Potro serve at love to give himself the chance to serve out the match. And serve it out he did, without a trace of nerves, to finish it off in straight sets.

It was an unfortunate end to the year for Juan Martin, but he was gracious in defeat, complimenting the Russian on his performance. "Congratulations Nikolay, you had a great week, you beat everyone and you're a great champion.". The praise was richly deserved.

The most recognisable names in doubles - the Bryan twins - won the Doubles crown for the 5th time in the last 7 years beating Max Mirnyi & Andy Ram in straight sets 7-6, 6-3. The title assured them of the top year-end ranking pipping the Nestor-Zimonjic pairing at the post. It was sweet revenge for the twins as they dropped the top ranking after losing last year's final to Nestor & Zimonjic.

FIle Photograph Copyright: Mark