Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus bags Australian Open title
Canberra: In the first Grand Slam Australian Open of the year, Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus has won the women’s singles title. Sabalenka won the Australian Open title for the first time by defeating Kazakhstan’s Elena Rybakina in a hard-fought two-and-a-half-hour final at the Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne on Saturday, January 28. Coming back after losing the first set, Sabalenka won the first Grand Slam of her career with a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 win.
In the tournament, the fourth seed Sabalenka had a tough challenge from the current Wimbledon champion Rybakina. Rybakina had reached the final by defeating 3 Grand Slam champion players including the current world number one Iga Swantek. In such a situation, he was being considered as a strong contender for the title.
Rybakina started the match in the same way and defeated Sabalenka 6-4 in the first set without any trouble. He had a chance to win the title in the next set but Sabalenka made a wonderful comeback and won the next set 6-3. However, during this, Sabalenka also committed double faults several times and gave Rybakina chances to come back.
Sabalenka, serving for the title of the deciding set, lost championship points 3 times and it seemed that Rybakina would take it to the tie-break but Sabalenka won on the fourth attempt.
This title is even more special for Rybakina because even once in this entire tournament, she neither heard the name of her country nor saw its flag. Both of these were not used in the TV graphics of the tournament, nor were the spectators allowed to wave flags. In fact, this player from Belarus had to pay the price for the Ukraine-Russia war.
