Canadian teen Victoria Mboko’s fairytale run at the Omnium Banque Nationale continued Monday night, as the 18-year-old advanced to her first WTA 1000-level semifinal, where she will face former Wimbledon champion and No. 9 seed Elena Rybakina.

Mboko, who was ranked outside the Top 300 at this time last year, defeated big-hitting Spaniard Jessica Bouzas Maneiro 6-4, 6-2 in front of a packed home crowd in Montreal. Following her run this week, she is projected to break into the world’s Top 50. Earlier in the day, Kazakhstan’s Rybakina reached her second semifinal in Montreal after Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk retired while trailing 6-1, 2-1.

Mboko dominates Bouzas Maneiro to continue breakthrough week

Mboko and Bouzas Maneiro both opened with powerful baseline exchanges and created multiple break point opportunities. However, the games remained on serve until Mboko broke her opponent in the eighth game, then served out the set 6-4.

Bouzas Maneiro responded by breaking Mboko’s serve in the first game of the second set and building a 2-0 lead. But the Canadian stormed back to win six consecutive games, closing out the match 6-4, 6-2 in 1 hour, 17 minutes.

Since 1970, Mboko is only the second local player to reach the semifinals at the Canadian Open, following Bianca Andreescu in 2019. She also becomes the youngest Canadian player in the Open Era to reach the semifinals at the event.

Mboko, coached by former Wimbledon finalist Nathalie Tauziat, is just the fourth Canadian woman to reach the semifinals at a Tier 1/WTA 1000 event, joining Helen Kelesi, Eugenie Bouchard and Andreescu.

Rybakina advances to 10th WTA 1000-level semifinal

In the evening’s first match, Rybakina advanced to the final four in Montreal when Kostyuk retired in the second set of their quarterfinal after 54 minutes of play.

Rybakina led 6-1, 2-1 when Kostyuk withdrew with a wrist injury. It marked her third consecutive win over her Ukrainian rival (U.S. Open 2023, Stuttgart 2024 and Montreal 2025), after losing their first meeting in 2023 (Adelaide).

This is Rybakina’s 10th WTA 1000-level semifinal and her fifth semifinal appearance of the season — the third most on tour behind world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka (nine) and No. 2 Iga Swiatek (seven).

Mboko seeks revenge in semifinal rematch

The semifinal between Mboko and Rybakina will be their second meeting in as many weeks, with Rybakina having defeated the Canadian 6-3, 7-5 at the Citi Open in Washington last week.

The remaining two women’s quarterfinals are scheduled for Tuesday. Australian Open champion Madison Keys, seeded No. 6, will take on No. 16 seed Clara Tauson of Denmark. No. 10 seed Elina Svitolina of Ukraine will face four-time Grand Slam champion and former world No. 1 Naomi Osaka.