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Unranked Italian completes dream week

Laura DeVittori, unranked and unseeded, completed a superb week yesterday when she overwhelmed top seed Lavern Stowe in straight sets ? 6-1, 6-0 ? to win the Ladies 40 singles title at the Coral Beach Club Invitational.

The Italian, visiting Bermuda for the first time, showed no mercy as she completed her run to victory in such devastating fashion that none of her opponents took more than four games during any one match.

Against Stowe, who had also waltzed into the final, DeVittori used her complete arsenal of strokes as she dominated from the first game.

DeVittori sounded a warning by winning that first first game at love. And before Stowe could catch her breath she was trailing 4-0.

?I just didn?t know what I had to do to get her out of her rhythm,? said a dejected Stowe when it was all over. ?After watching her play against Veronica (Dunkerley) I decided that I wouldn?t use my power game because the harder you hit, the harder she returns and usually in a place where you are not.

?But when I took the power off, she generated power from my strokes.?

In the second set, Stowe again decided to alter her strategy. ?I decided that I would keep the ball deep and then drop shot her, but before I realised what was happening she had taken my strategy and was keeping me deep and then hitting those deadly drop shots.

?When I did run a few of then down she was already in position to push the ball past me down the line for the point.?

Meanwhile, the Canadian duo of Patrick O?Kelly and first-timer Tervor Gow outduelled the American combination of Dick Mount and Peter Head to take the Men?s 65 doubles title with a straight sets 6-4, 6-2 victory.

After losing a close first set, Mount and Head opened the second with some good points, giving rise to the thought that they just might stage a comeback. But that was quickly dashed when their opponents ran off five straight games for a 5-1 lead on the way to victory.

Mount, who has been coming to Bermuda in his words ?forever?, quipped: ?I?m going home for a vacation.?

Americans Ann Jacobs and Carolyn McCoy hoisted the flag of the Longwood Cricket Club under lights when they upset the top seeded pair of Gill Butterfield and Jill Finnigan in straight sets 7-5, 6-3 to capture the Ladies Open doubles title.

Trailing 4-5 with McCoy serving for the first set, the locals were able to break when McCoy and Jacobs were wide with two backhands to level at 5-5.

But they were unable to take advantage when Finnigan, down 15-40, missed an easy overhead at the net.

The second set was close until the score was 3-2 after a break, but when Jacobs held for a 4-2 lead, the writing was on the wall.

?We just had to play our game,? Jacobsaid afterwards. ?We couldn?t play Gill?s game because she loves to lob, and is very good at that so we had to keep focused.?