Tennis Roundup : Navratilova Tops It With $125,000

For Martina Navratilova, 1986 has been a very good year.

She capped it Sunday with a 7-6, 6-3, 6-2 victory over West Germany’s Steffi Graf to win the $1 million Virginia Slims Championships tennis tournament at New York.

Navratilova moved closer to the $12 million career earnings mark after collecting $428,657 in winnings and bonus money. The singles victory was worth $125,000, while Graf received $60,000.

“The whole year’s been great,” Navratilova said. “I’ve won the Slims twice and Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, and going to Czechoslovakia and winning there and just being there, and finding my dog when he got lost in Los Angeles.

“That’s probably the happiest I’ve been all year.”

Sunday’s victory increased her consecutive match winning streak to 53--the fourth-longest streak behind her record of 74, a string of 56 by Chris Evert Lloyd and Navratilova’s 54 straight.

“This was 53, and I’ll probably break Chris’ record again, so I’ll have the top two spots,” she said.

Graf, 17, of West Germany, said: “She just smacked it all over me. She really played a good match. She served very well.”

Not once did Navratilova lose her serve, and Graf never reached break point.

Slobodan Zivojinovic of Yugoslavia capitalized on consecutive double faults by Scott Davis to score a 6-1, 4-6, 6-3 victory in the final of the $279,000 WCT Houston Shootout.

Zivojinovic, winning his first Grand Prix tournament, took control when Davis faltered in the sixth game of the third set. Trailing 3-2, but even on serve, Davis led 30-15 when he committed the back-to-back double faults. Zivojinovic increased his lead to 5-2 and 40-love, but it took four match points before he won the first prize of $44,000.

In the men’s doubles final, Ricardo Acuna and Brad Pearce upset the third-seeded team of Chip Hooper and Mike Leach, 6-4, 7-5.

Amos Mansdorf of Israel defeated Matt Anger, 6-3, 3-6, 6-2, 7-5, to win the South African Open at Johannesburg for his first Grand Prix title.

Mansdorf, ranked No. 72 by the Association of Tennis Professionals, needed 2 hours 23 minutes to record the victory before a capacity crowd of 7,000. He earned $43,000.

Anger, former USC star, defeated South African-born Johan Kriek to reach the final. He earned $21,500.

Unseeded Peter Fleming beat second-seeded Jan Gunnarsson of Sweden, 6-4, 6-1, to win the $50,000 Bergen Open ATP tournament at Bergen, Norway.

In a three-hour doubles final, Kelly Jones of San Diego and David Livingston of Hollywood downed Peter Bastiansen of Denmark and Patrick Kuhnen of West Germany 6-7, 7-6, 7-5.

Fleming, 31, the world’s leading doubles player with John McEnroe, said he could not remember when he last won a big singles tournament.

“I’ve entered a lot but haven’t won them,” Fleming said. “I reached the semifinals of a Grand Prix tournament indoors at Toronto last February. That was my best singles performance this year before winning here.”

Ken Rosewall defeated Mal Anderson, 6-2, 6-1, to win the $40,000 Mutual Benefit Co. Grand Masters Tennis Tournament in Miami.

In doubles, Roy Emerson and Fred Stolle defeated Anderson and Neale Fraser, 6-2, 6-4.