{"id":829659,"date":"2026-07-27T18:04:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T18:04:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/829659\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T18:04:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T18:04:09","slug":"canadas-leylah-fernandez-begins-title-defence-with-first-round-win-at-d-c-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/829659\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada\u2019s Leylah Fernandez begins title defence with first-round win at D.C. Open"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1785175449_697_imageRedirect.jpeg\" class=\"object-fit-cover\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Leylah Fernandez of Canada reacts after scoring a point against Coco Gauff of the United States during a women&#8217;s singles match of the China Open tennis tournament, at the National Tennis Center, in Beijing, China, Sunday, Sept. 28, 2025. (AP Photo\/Mahesh Kumar A.)<\/p>\n<p>By The Canadian Press<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\tJul 27, 2026 | 10:50 AM\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>WASHINGTON \u2014 Canada\u2019s Leylah Fernandez opened her title defence with a first-round victory at the D.C. Open on Monday.<\/p>\n<p>Fernandez, the tournament\u2019s seventh seed, downed Poland\u2019s Magda Linette 6-1, 6-4, winning the match in one hour 19 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>The 23-year-old from Laval, Que., captured the title at the WTA 500 hard-court event last year for the biggest tournament win of her career.<\/p>\n<p>Fernandez ranks 34th in the world but has struggled to find a rhythm this year, posting a 13-19 record in singles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leylah Fernandez of Canada reacts after scoring a point against Coco Gauff of the United States during a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":829660,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[49,48,44],"class_list":["post-829659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829659","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=829659"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829659\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/829660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=829659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=829659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=829659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}