{"id":52454,"date":"2025-08-07T16:45:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T16:45:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/52454\/"},"modified":"2025-08-07T16:45:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T16:45:08","slug":"victoria-mboko-and-naomi-osaka-to-face-off-in-montreal-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/52454\/","title":{"rendered":"Victoria Mboko and Naomi Osaka to face off in Montreal final"},"content":{"rendered":"

Four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka and Canadian teen sensation Victoria Mboko booked a championship showdown with gritty semi-final wins on Wednesday in the WTA Canadian Open in Montreal.<\/p>\n

Japan’s Osaka<\/a>, chasing her first tour-level title since the 2021 Australian Open, saved a pair of set points in the second-set tiebreak to polish off a 6-2, 7-6(7)<\/a> victory over Denmark’s Clara Tauson<\/a> – who was coming off victories over Wimbledon champion Iga Swiatek<\/a> and Australian Open winner Madison Keys<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mboko<\/a> saved a match point in a thrilling 1-6, 7-5, 7-6(4)<\/a> victory over former Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The 18-year-old wildcard fed off the energy of the crowd, crediting ecstatic supporters with carrying her through after a tumble left her with a sore right wrist in the third set of her first tour-level semi-final.<\/p>\n

Mboko, who ousted top-seeded French Open champion Coco Gauff<\/a> in the fourth round, didn’t let it stop her.<\/p>\n

After going down an early break in the third set she refused to go quietly, loading up on her forehand and fending off a match point as she broke Rybakina in the 10th game to level the set.<\/p>\n

A couple of untimely double faults helped ninth-seeded Rybakina break back for a 6-5 lead, but the ninth seed from Kazakhstan was broken to love in the next game, setting the stage for the tiebreak drama.<\/p>\n

“After I had that fall I wasn’t in the greatest spirits, but I’m happy that I kept my composure and I was kind of patient in the right moments,” said Mboko, who won the last three points of a decider she called “stressful”.<\/p>\n

“Anything can happen,” an exhausted Mboko beamed as the crowd’s cheers rained down on her.<\/p>\n

“Unfortunately I fell, but I had everyone supporting me and pushing me.”<\/p>\n

Mboko started the season ranked outside the top 300 but had worked her way up to 85th coming into the week by grinding away in lower-level tournaments.<\/p>\n

She is assured of breaking into the top 40 no matter the result against Osaka, a former world number one who has struggled to find consistency since returning from maternity leave in 2024 after more than a year away.<\/p>\n

Resurgent Osaka<\/p>\n

Osaka has looked re-energised this week after a coaching shakeup and rolled through the first set against Tauson.<\/p>\n

But Tauson twice regained a break in the second set as she pushed it to the tiebreaker where she had chances to level the match after taking a 6-4 lead.<\/p>\n

Unable to convert her set points, the Dane saved one match point to make it 7-7, but Osaka won the next two to seal the victory and reach her first final in a WTA 1000 level event since Miami in 2022.<\/p>\n

“Definitely really happy,” said Osaka, who started the week ranked 49th in the world. “(I’m) excited to play my first hard court final back.”<\/p>\n

Osaka, whose performance so far this week means she’s assured of rising high enough in the rankings to be seeded at the US Open later this month, was bracing for a tough match against a player who said in a youthful interview that she idolised the Japanese star.<\/p>\n

“I watched her play today because they were the match in front of us. I thought it was really impressive how she stayed calm,” said Osaka, adding that Mboko’s rebound from match point down was “really impressive for an 18-year-old.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka and Canadian teen sensation Victoria Mboko booked a championship showdown with gritty…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52455,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":{"0":"post-52454","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\/52454","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=52454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}