Elena Rybakina dominated this week at the 2024 Brisbane International, and that includes the final, which put her in elite company with Serena Williams.
When Elena Rybakina bested Elise Mertens earlier this week in less than an hour, many fans around the world went 'wait a minute'. She was spectacular this week and finished in an equal manner.
Facing Aryna Sabalenka in the final should have guaranteed that she would lose at least five games in the match right? Wrong, she actually lost only 3 by beating Sabalenka 6-0 6-3 which the Belarusian could only laugh at.
She poked fun both at herself and her team after the match during the speeches for the effort. Rybakina thought that the scoreline wasn't really realistic because a lot of the games were quite competitive and close.
Well, I think the score doesn't show the reality because all the games were quite tight, to be honest. Couple of moments maybe I was a bit luckier. I knew that no matter the score, is going to be still difficult in the second set. It was just few moments again where it could turn other way around.
Well, close or not, the score was still impressive and puts her in elite company next to players like Serena Williams. She became only the third player since 2000 to drop three games against a WTA Top 3 ranked player at that time in a WTA final.
That's an impressive stat, and it's not a surprise that only two other players did it, one of which is the legendary American, who did it in the 2007 Australian Open final against Maria Sharapova.
The other player is Flavia Pennetta, who bested Agnieszka Radwanska in the 2014 Indian Wells final. Despite the dominant scoreline, after the match, Rybakina remained very humble.
As I said, I didn't expect that the scores are going to be like this. In the end, I think it was still not as easy as it might look from outside.
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