Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka crowned winner

Aryna Sabalenka won the Australian Open, her first grand slam title, beating Kazakh Elena Rybakina in the final on Saturday January 28.

Source AFP

Born twenty-four years ago in Minsk, Aryna Sabalenka started playing tennis at the age of 6 and by chance, when, driving past with her father Sergei – himself an ice hockey player – in front of the courts, they decided to give him a try.
© MANAN VATSYAYANA / AFP

Published on 01/28/2023 at 1:13 p.m
– Modified 01/28/2023 at 2:16 p.m.

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AWith her tiger’s head tattooed on her forearm, Aryna Sabalenka is one of the symbols of power on the tennis courts, but it took her years to tame her nervousness and thus win the Grail, a title of the grand slam. At 24, the Belarusian, 5^e world, beat the Kazakh and 25^e world champion Elena Rybakina 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 in the final of the Australian Open, Saturday January 28, in Melbourne. With this title, Aryna Sabalenka will regain second place in the world, the best ranking of her career.

His opponent, Elena Rybakina, 23 years old and winner at Wimbledon last year without WTA points distributed, will go up to 10^e world rank, also his highest ranking.

A very risky game

Aryna Sabalenka played some very risky tennis that took a while to set up, but ended up paying on her fourth match point in a game where Elena Rybakina had a chance to redo her late break. Once Rybakina’s final ball bounced out of bounds, Sabalenka lay crying alone on the court. When she got up, Rybakina was already there to take her in his arms.

The Belarusian remained on three knockout stages in Melbourne in the last three editions. She had already played three grand slam semi-finals (Wimbledon 2021, US Open 2021 and 2022) without ever reaching the final. But she had already played and won a final at the Australian Open, in 2021 in doubles, associated with the Belgian Elise Mertens.

For his part, Rybakina had never passed the third round in three appearances so far at the Australian Major. She had reached her best ranking in January 2022 at 12^e world rank. His victory last year at Wimbledon had brought him no points: the WTA and the ATP had decided to deprive the Major on grass of ranking points for his refusal to accept Russian and Belarusian players in retaliation for the war in Ukraine.

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