Tennis news in brief: Tsonga defeats Monfils | Baltacha beaten | Raonic wins second title

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France’s Jo-Wilfried Tsonga overcame compatriot Gael Monfils 7-5, 6-3 in the final to claim his eighth career title in slippery conditions on Saturday.

Monfils beat top seed Rafael Nadal in his semi-final, while Tsonga received a bye when Roger Federer withdrew with a back injury, giving the bulky Frenchman an extra day’s rest.

That advantage ultimately told in the final, but Tsonga started sluggishly before rallying from 5-3 down in the first set as he claimed nine of the next 11 games against a fading opponent.

“At the beginning of the match Gael was incredible, he was everywhere,” said Tsonga.

l Estonia’s Kaia Kanepi won her second career title as she stormed to a 6-2, 6-1 win over Daniela Hantuchova in the Brisbane International final.

Seeds Monica Niculescu and Ksenia Pervak were knocked out of the Moorilla Hobart International on the first day of competition. Romania’s Niculescu, seeded third, failed to even get on the board in her first set against Russia’s Anna Chakvetadze and, despite an improved showing in the second, crashed to a 6-0, 6-4 defeat. But compatriot Sorana Cirstea dumped out Pervak, the seventh seed from Kazakhstan, 6-2, 7-6 (8/6) in an hour and 42 minutes to progress.

That left another Romanian, Irina-Camelia Begu, as the only seed to progress on the day after she enjoyed a 6-2, 7-5 win over Scotland’s Elena Baltacha. Australia’s Anastasia Rodionova beat Hungarian Greta Arn 6-4, 7-5 while Simona Halep came from a set down to beat Czech Klara Zakopalova 4-6, 6-2, 7-5.

Milos Raonic, of Canada, won the second title of his career on Sunday after beating top-seeded Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia 6-7 (4), 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4) in a serve-dominated final of the Chennai Open. Fourth-seeded Raonic hit 35 aces in a marathon match that lasted three hours, 16 minutes and didn’t feature a break of serve. “It is an awesome feeling,” said the 21-year-old Raonic, who won all 48 of his service games during the week to become the first player to win a tournament without dropping serve since Roger Federer at the 2008 grass-court tournament in Halle.

Meanwhile, Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova and Tomas Berdych produced some impeccable tennis to give the Czech Republic the Hopman Cup with a 2-0 win over France in the final on Saturday.