RIYADH, Saudi Arabia \u2014 Elena Rybakina won the WTA Finals after producing a nearly flawless performance to beat No. 1-ranked Aryna Sabalenka 6-3, 7-6 (0) on Saturday.<\/p>\n
The sixth-ranked Rybakina struck eight aces and converted the sole break of the match on the indoor hardcourt in Riyadh.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been an incredible week. I honestly didn\u2019t expect any result and to go so far is just incredible,\u201d Rybakina said about a title run that included wins over No. 2-seeded Iga Swiatek, Amanda Anisimova and Jessica Pegula.<\/p>\n
It was a second loss in the final of the season-ending tournament for Sabalenka after the four-time Grand Slam winner lost to Caroline Garcia in the 2022 title match.<\/p>\n
Rybakina, the 2022 Wimbledon champion, was playing her first title match in her third consecutive WTA Finals appearance.<\/p>\n
She collected $5.23 million after going 5-0 at the event featuring the top eight women. The WTA said that was the largest payout in the history of women\u2019s sports. Sabalenka earned $2.7 million as runner-up.<\/p>\n
Rybakina broke for a 4-2 lead in the first set, and Sabalenka then saved four break points in the second to force the tiebreaker. The Belarusian entered the match with a 22\u20132 record in tiebreakers this year, but was shut out in this one \u2014 hitting a backhand return long on match point.<\/p>\n
Rybakina recorded her tour-best 45th hardcourt win of the season. The 26-year-old Kazakhstani became the 10th straight first-time winner of the WTA Finals. She will finish the year at a career-high No. 5 in the rankings after a 58\u201319 record that included three titles.<\/p>\n
Sabalenka will finish ranked No. 1 for a second straight season. This year, she won four titles, including the U.S. Open, and had 63 match wins. She also reached the finals of the French Open and Australian Open.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe played incredible,\u201d Sabalenka said about Rybakina. \u201cI feel like I did my best today. It didn\u2019t work, but I think so many things I have to be proud of. And yeah, I\u2019m leaving this tournament without any disappointment.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RIYADH, Saudi Arabia \u2014 Elena Rybakina won the WTA Finals after producing a nearly flawless performance to beat…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271490,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":{"0":"post-271489","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}