Petra Kvitova took confidence from her winning record against Elina Svitolina as the Czech dug deep to claim a comeback victory in the WTA Elite Trophy final.

Having won the past five meetings between the pair, Kvitova was surprisingly slow out of the blocks on Sunday and fell 4-1 down in the opener, but surged back to triumph 6-4 6-2 in Zuhai.

And the two-time Wimbledon champion revealed she had drawn on her experience against the Ukrainian to get the job done.

"Those wins helped me with my confidence," Kvitova told the WTA Tour website. "In the last match, I was also a break down in the beginning of the match, and I was still able to turn it around. That helped me when I was on the court, having that in mind.

"I can't say she plays a comfortable game, but I just know I need to play aggressively. She likes to play aggressively, too, so I just need to be the first one who is putting pressure on her and play what I can.

"Sometimes, it ends up being a longer rally than I'd like, but that's the game. She's doing what she has to do to beat me. 

"I think my serve helped me a lot and I need to return well, which I was doing pretty good.

"In the rallies, she's really going for it, so it's just about the few [key] points, and that turned the match on my side."