Former US Open finalist Leylah Fernandez halted No.4 seed Elena Rybakina’s return to action in the second round of the Cincinnati Open, triumphing 3-6, 7-6(3), 6-4 from double match point down in the second set.
Cincinnati: Scores | Draws | Order of Play
Rybakina was playing her first match since falling in the Wimbledon semifinals to eventual champion Barbora Krejcikova. Acute bronchitis had forced the Kazakhstani to withdraw from both the Paris Olympic Games and last week’s WTA 1000 event in Toronto, and her rust showed throughout in the form of 17 double faults. Two of those came on both of her match points as she served at 6-5 in the second set.
Fernandez has been enjoying a resurgent season, and returned to the Top 30 in June after an absence of nearly two years. The Canadian took advantage to seal her fifth career Top 5 win, and first since she knocked out three Top 5 opponents to reach the 2021 US Open final.
How did Fernandez pull off the upset?
The 21-year-old was coming off a disappointing second-round loss to Ashlyn Krueger in her home event of Toronto last week, and had needed to come from a set and a break down to escape Yuan Yue in her Cincinnati opener. But she demonstrated in the first game that she was eager to take on the challenge of Rybakina, smacking two winners to break immediately.
Like Rybakina, Fernandez also struggled for consistency throughout. She fired 26 winners, but also committed 27 unforced errors — including 13 double faults of her own. In the second set, they seemed to have been her undoing when she threw in two in a row to drop serve at 5-3.
Ultimately, Fernandez pulled through due to her superior match management. After Rybakina had squandered her two match points, Fernandez pounced with two clean winners to break back, then dominated the ensuing tiebreak. In the decider, Rybakina managed to serve her way out of her first troublesome service game, escaping triple break point serving at 2-3. But Fernandez — who did not face a break point herself in the third set — was undaunted, breaking to love at her next opportunity for 4-3.
What were the positives for Rybakina to take?
The former Wimbledon champion never found her groove in the match; her 17 double faults were part of a total of 50 unforced errors, frequently wild misses off routine rally balls. She won just 35% of the points behind her second serve.
However, in her first match in over a month, Rybakina still managed to fire 41 winners, including 20 aces. And despite fading at the end of both the second and third sets, one stand-out statistic was her break point conversion rate: she took six out of her seven chances.
What’s next for Fernandez?
A first encounter with the in-form Diana Shnaider. The 20-year-old has barely stopped over the past three weeks: after winning the Olympic silver medal in doubles, she immediately made the Toronto semifinals the following week. Shnaider’s surge continued in Cincinnati with a 7-5, 6-0 win over Krueger.