World No 1 Aryna Sabalenka, on Saturday, successfully defended her US Open title with a thrilling 6-4 7-6 (7-3) win over Amanda Anisimova in New York, United States.
Sabalenka sealed a hard-fought victory against Anisimova at Flushing Meadows, making her the first woman to win the tournament in consecutive years since Serena Williams in 2014.
The Belarusian picked up the fourth Grand Slam title of her career as a result, all on hard courts – having now added two New York triumphs to her pair of Australian Open trophies.
Both women were looking to bury recent scar tissue, with Anisimova back in a major final 56 days after her Wimbledon whitewash, while Sabalenka suffered heart-breaking defeats at the Australian Open and French Open – forced to apologise after an ungracious press conference towards winner Coco Gauff at the latter.
Sabalenka also lost to Anisimova in the semi-finals at Wimbledon, putting her in the strange position of being by a distance the best player in the world but without a major trophy in 2025, but she quelled a fightback from her opponent to secure the silverware.
The set was threatening to run away from Anisimova in a similar fashion to Wimbledon, but she told herself above all this tournament to be brave and she powered winners into opposite corners to finally get on the board.
Having won one game, she quickly made that three in a row, the crowd greeting every winner with a huge cheer.
The American was dominating both the winner and error count and it was the latter that climbed again as Sabalenka responded with four games in a row to take the opening set.
Anisimova, who was struggling with the roof lighting on her ball toss, was too inconsistent to apply any solid pressure.
Anisimova slammed a ball down in frustration when a backhand pass from Sabalenka gave her another break in the third game of the second set and, although she fought back to level, the eighth seed’s serve was too much of a liability.
Sabalenka forged ahead again to lead 5-3 and soon found herself serving for the title.
Perhaps it was inevitable that it would not be straightforward. Anisimova somehow dug out a backhand lob that Sabalenka dumped into the net to give herself a chance to level and more huge hitting made it 5-5.
If there was a moment for the demons to resurface, it was now, but Sabalenka took the set to a tie-break, where she has been untouchable this season, and this time finished the job.
Anisimova’s final tally of 29 unforced errors, including seven double faults, was ultimately too many, but the American, who started the year ranked outside the top 30, will have the consolation of being a top-four player on Monday.
Reacting to her win, Sabalenka, who fell to her knees after clinching victory with an unreturnable serve and jumped up and down with her coaches in the stands in a scene of utter joy, said, “I want to thank everyone who came here, who flew in to be there in my box.
“I’m going to reach a lot more finals and I don’t care where you are in the world I want you in my box.”
Also speaking after her loss, Anisimova, who was left in tears yet again after the heartbreak of her 6-0 6-0 drubbing in the Wimbledon final two months ago, said, “It’s been a great summer, losing in two finals in a row is great but it’s also super hard.
“I didn’t fight hard enough for my dreams today.”
She later admitted having problems seeing the ball with the glare of the roof causing her issues when serving.
“I haven’t played on the court during the day with the roof closed. It was literally white, and I couldn’t see the ball when I was serving the whole match.
“It started from the warm-up. I was like, ‘this is really going to be a problem for me’. I didn’t know what to do.
“There was no way of adjusting, because I could not see the ball when I was serving, and that was a huge shock to my system, because I knew if I can’t hold my serve, it was going to be very tough to stay in the match,” she said. (Punch)
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