Rybakina won the US Open and became the first racket of the world

On September 12, representative of Kazakhstan Elena Rybakina beat Belarusian tennis player Arina Sobolenko in the final match of the US Open. The tournament is being held in New York.

The game ended with a score 6:4, 5:7, 6:2. At the last competitions, the Belarusian athlete performed under the first number of the seed, the Kazakh one — under the second.

"To be honest, it's hard to find the words right now. It's so hard to play against Arina; she pushes you to the limit. I was dying on the court against her. I was just trying to get all the balls I could," Rybakina said on the court, as quoted by "Sport—Express".

In addition, the tennis player congratulated her opponent on her achievements and called the work of her team amazing. She also expressed her gratitude to the spectators of the tournament.

For Rybakina, this title became the third in the Grand Slam tournaments. She previously won Wimbledon in 2022 and the Australian Open in 2026. Now the athlete has to win at Roland Garros in order to collect a career Grand Slam — to become the best in each of the four most prestigious competitions. The last person to achieve this result was Russian Maria Sharapova in 2012. It was Sharapova who presented Rybakina with the cup at the award ceremony in New York.

Following the results of the tournament, a native of Moscow will lead the ranking of the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for the first time. She will displace Sobolenko from the first line, who has been in the lead since October 2024. Rybakina will become the 30th tennis player in history to reach the status of the first racket of the world.

In addition, Rybakina became the second athlete since the publication of the WTA rankings in 1975, who managed to beat the world ranking leader in several Grand Slam finals in one season. In 2026, she also defeated Sobolenko in the deciding match of the Australian Open. Previously, only German Steffi Graf had achieved such a result in 1995.

For Arina Sobolenko, the last final was the fourth in a row at the US Open. In the Open era, which began in 1968, only Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Serena Williams and Steffi Graf achieved a similar achievement. The defeat in the final ended Sobolenko's winning streak at this tournament, which was 20 matches. Before that, she lost on the courts of New York in 2023 in the final meeting with American Coco Gauff.

Sports weekend with Izvestia

The finish of the US Open tennis tournament, the central matches of the RPL and KHL, the games of Russian football players in Europe

The day before, American tennis player Ben Shelton defeated compatriot Francis Tiafoe in the semifinals of the US Open. The meeting ended with a score 4:6, 6:3, 6:3, 7:5 in favor of the 23-year-old athlete.