ALLAN THE MAN

ISTANBUL - Serena Williams completed her sensational 2012 comeback by easing to a 6-4, 6-3 win over Maria Sharapova for a third WTA Championships title on Sunday.

The 31-year-old's victory came at the end of a spectacular year in which she also collected the Wimbledon, Olympic and US Open titles.

"Now I have won I can be honest -- I really wanted to win this title, and I put pressure on myself (to do so)," said Williams, whose career head-to-head record over Sharapova now stands at 10-2.

Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova will battle it out for Olympic gold on Saturday afternoon. 

Going into the London 2012 Olympics, Serena and Sharapova were the only players in the field who have achieved the legendary career Grand Slam (Serena achieved the feat back in 2002 with Sharapova completing the set in June). As such it seems only right that they're battling it out in the final with the winner achieving the career Golden Grand Slam.

Steffi Graf (who won all four slams and Olympic gold back in 1988) is the only other player to have managed this. 

Serena will be strong favourite to win her first singles gold medal (she's won two doubles golds with her sister Venus) given her progress through the draw so far this week. The American has yet to concede more than three games in a set and she's destroyed Vera Zvonareva, Caroline Wozniacki and Victoria Azarenka in success. Given how good those players are (they've all reached Grand Slam finals), for Serena to beat them all dropping just 7 games across the three matches, is simply remarkable.