Even after she had won grand slam titles and conquered all surfaces, Elena Rybakina has always been considered lesser than the greatest players of her era. She has long been one of the most devastating shotmakers in the world, but there were always a couple more consistent and mentally tougher players above her.
She leaves New York, finally, as the undisputed best tennis player on the planet, the new standard bearer of the women’s game, after following up her snatching of the No 1 ranking from Aryna Sabalenka by succeeding her as the US Open champion. As she has done throughout this unforgettable week, the Kazakhstani showed her toughness in another spectacular tussle with her great rival, nervelessly closing out a 6-4, 5-7, 6-2 victory over Sabalenka, the top seed and two-time defending champion.
Related: Elena Rybakina beats Aryna Sabalenka to win US Open for first time – as it happened
Before the final, Rybakina had not always played her best tennis this year in New York, but the past two weeks stand as the greatest mental performance of her career. She has had to overcome an achilles injury that sidelined her for a week before the tournament and left her uncertain if she would even compete. There was also the immense pressure of trying to clinch the world No 1 ranking. Then four consecutive grand slam or Olympic champions laid in wait for her during the second week of the tournament. She cleared every hurdle without hesitation.
Her trials throughout the past fortnight imbued her with the confidence to play such a composed match against her biggest rival to close out the tournament. Here, the 27-year-old began the match with her serve, the most important shot in her arsenal, completely misfiring, yet she still showed off the breadth of her game by completely overpowering Sabalenka from the baseline. When the Belarusian fought her way back into the match and forced a final set, Rybakina was unfazed. She saved her best serving for the most important stretch, flitting through her service games early in set three and putting pressure on Sabalenka to keep up. Sabalenka, like so many players over the past year, simply could not.
Rybakina has become known and loved for her understated reactions to such monumental achievements, but after shouting in jubilation following her semi-final win over Coco Gauff, here she triumphantly raised both hands into the air upon firing down her 12th ace of the match to seal the victory. It meant everything. “It’s still so difficult to process what happened,” she said. “Too much achievements these few weeks. I’m super happy, very proud of all the work. Yeah, it’s just amazing. Difficult to find words, but super happy.”
In addition to taking Sabalenka’s No 1 ranking, Rybakina has now also taken the status as the best hard-court player in the world. She now holds the three biggest hard-court titles: the Australian Open, the US Open and the WTA Finals. She joins figures such as Lindsay Davenport, Jennifer Capriati, Ash Barty, Angelique Kerber and Virginia Wade as three-time grand slam champions. Having previously won Wimbledon in 2022 and the 2026 Australian Open, Rybakina is suddenly a French Open away from completing the career grand slam.
Sabalenka’s run to the final was an impressive feat considering how disastrous her past few months have been on the tour, but there was no consoling her after this defeat. Although she showed good sportsmanship in all of her interactions with Rybakina, including initiating a warm hug at the net, Sabalenka tossed her racket and then slumped into a seat in her courtside player box. When a cameraperson approached her, they were quickly told to “fuck off”.
Sabalenka has reached eight consecutive grand slam finals on hard courts, an astounding feat, but any competitor in her shoes would be upset by the number of titles she has been able to win from those positions. Sabalenka is now 4-6 in grand slam finals and just hasn’t been able to produce her best tennis when it matters most. Most painfully of all, her opportunity to three-peat at the US Open has come and gone: “It’s really tough to control your emotions when you lose in the final of the grand slam and when you were trying to go for three-peat,” Sabalenka said of her on-court emotions. “So I just wanted to let it go, because if I would hold it inside, right now or here or there on the court, I wouldn’t be able to say a word or I would just go not really nice over there. So I just wanted to let all of that aggression and disappointment go outside.”
This was a historic encounter. Since the Australian Open became a hard court tournament in 1988, this is just the second time that the same two players contested both finals in the same year. It is also the third time that the top two players in the world have competed in a grand slam final with the ranking switching hands. No matter the terrain or stakes, though, these two champions inspire a high level of tennis from each other. Their three major finals have each produced dramatic, high quality three-set matches.
However, for a long time Sabalenka was clearly the superior player in this rivalry, even if Rybakina could beat her on any given day. This year the terms of engagement have truly shifted with Rybakina winning their last two grand slam finals in addition to defeating Sabalenka in the championship match of the WTA Finals. It is now up to Sabalenka to return to the practice court and figure out a way past the new leader of her sport.
Afterwards, as Sabalenka discussed the end of her reign at No 1, she was informed that her time on top of the WTA rankings had lasted for 99 consecutive weeks, the sixth longest consecutive run at No 1 in history: “Well, that’s amazing. Let’s see if Elena can beat me in that,” she said, laughing. Then she added: “If she continues to play like that? Then, yeah, I’m in trouble.”
