Daria Gavrilova has fallen 5-7 6-3 7-6 (7-3) to sixth seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the final of the Hong Kong Open.

The pair, whose final started on Sunday five hours later due to typhoon winds and rain from the storm 200km away in the South China Sea, were interrupted within a few points of the finish after three hours of play in the final set.

Luckily, the showers passed after a few minutes, with the contest resuming in a match which ended with 16 combined breaks of serve and 17 double-faults.

Pavlyuchenkova wasted two winning chances in the 10th game to drop serve.

But with the sixth seed holding a pair of break points in the 11th game over her Russian-born opponent, the match was paused.

They came back and played for 12 more minutes, with a tiebreak finally deciding the outcome.

Both women were under time constraints as they play next week in Moscow.

Seventh seed Gavrilova fought back from a deficit to win the marathon opening set 7-5, but was unable to do the same in the second, as her opponent levelled the match with a 6-3 winning set.

The Australian world No.22 was chasing a second title of the season after her breakthrough success at the Connecticut Open in August.

Pavlyuchenkova is seeded fifth in Moscow while Gavrilova takes the sixth seeding in an event where weekend Tianjin winner Maria Sharapova will be playing as a wildcard.

Gavrilova won her only previous meeting with Pavlyuchenkova a year ago in the Kremlin Cup quarter-final in Moscow.