Australian Open final analysis: Elena Rybakina beats Aryna Sabalenka for second Grand Slam title

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MELBOURNE, Australia — Elena Rybakina beat Aryna Sabalenka 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 in the Australian Open final at Melbourne Park Saturday night.

The No. 5 seed prevailed over the No. 1 seed in a tight, serve-dominated match, ultimately decided by Rybakina’s first-set efficiency, two pivotal runs of games and Sabalenka’s inability to impose her variety on the contest.

It is Rybakina’s first Australian Open title and her second Grand Slam singles title. The win takes her back to No. 3 in the world, and is her first major since Wimbledon 2022.

The Athletic’s Charlie Eccleshare and Matt Futterman analyze the final and what it means for tennis.

How did the first game define the opening set?

Sabalenka knows as well as anyone that it’s not about how many points a player wins on serve, but which points they win. During the U.S. Open semifinal in September, she pulled off the ultimate returning heist by winning just four points on Jessica Pegula’s serve in a third set that Sabalenka won 6-4.

In the opening set Saturday night, Sabalenka produced a generally clean serving performance. She held comfortably in three of her four service games, hit four aces to her opponent’s two and played with a much higher first-serve percentage (68 percent to Rybakina’s 48).

But in the one game when the world No. 1 did find herself in trouble — the match opener — Sabalenka lost her serve despite making seven first serves from the eight points played.

Rybakina was under more scoreboard pressure in her service games, but Sabalenka’s opportunities were mostly illusions. Being broken in the first game of a Grand Slam final, especially against a server as strong as Rybakina, is hard enough; having it happen behind so many first serves, some of which were dispatched for winners because they did not meet their mark, is even tougher to take.

— Charlie Eccleshare

How did Rybakina continue a welcome streak in her game?

Since she began her revival in the second half of last year, finding a way out of trouble has been one of Rybakina’s hallmarks. Having one of the game’s most dangerous serves certainly helps. It’s flat and hard and heavy, and with her height, it can feel like it’s dropping off a tall building.

Women’s tennis is far less serve-dominated than men’s tennis but Rybakina grabbed the early edge in the way she so often does, coming up with big serves when she needed them.

In the first set, with Rybakina landing just 48 percent of her first serves, she hit the right balls at the right time. When Sabalenka was serving in that set, she played two points at either 30-30 or 40-40 and lost them both. Rybakina played the same number and won them both.

When Rybakina was serving at 4-3, Sabalenka got her best chance to draw even by earning two break points for 15-40. What happened next didn’t surprise anyone who has been watching Rybakina the past few months. She blasted three first serves in a row that Sabalenka didn’t have a prayer of getting back.

Few dynamics in tennis are more frustrating than earning chances to break an opponent and then not even being able to start a point, especially in a major final. After the third one, Sabalenka raised her racket and started to swat it at the ground, then decided to hold her temper and save her energy.

She didn’t see any more chances in the set, as Rybakina served it out two games later with little stress. The player who lost a match-deciding tiebreak here two years ago by playing tentatively over a 42-point, 31-minute battle seemed a distant memory.

— Matt Futterman

How did eight points (briefly) flip the momentum?

For the better part of 80 minutes, it seemed like the final was largely happening to Sabalenka. Rybakina was not quite dictating the terms of the match, but she was keeping Sabalenka on her heels, especially when the world No. 1 was returning and struggling to attack all the second serves she was getting looks at.

That all changed at 4-4 in the second set.

With the flick of a switch, or maybe just with a series of clean serves, Sabalenka came alive and started playing the way she played in the U.S. Open final. She banged home one first serve after another, got her feet inside the court and forced Rybakina into four consecutive errors.

For the first time all night, that shifted the pressure to Rybakina, who had to serve to stay in the set. Sabalenka made sure she didn’t have a moment to breathe.

Rybakina seemed to feel it, committing an unforced error on the first point, then missing her first serve on the second. That allowed Sabalenka to pounce. She jumped into a backhand return of serve, then whacked an inside-in forehand winner. After another forehand error from Rybakina, Sabalenka drew Rybakina in with a slice, then whacked a forehand pass down the line.

Rybakina’s volleys are a weakness she has successfully corrected this tournament, but she didn’t get this one right. She got her strings on the ball, merely deflecting it into the doubles alley. Sabalenka turned to her box and pumped her fist. Eighteen of 19 first-serve points won in the set, eight points in a row, one set apiece, and all the momentum on her racket. She converted it into a run of five games in a row, which took her from behind to the cusp of victory. Or so it seemed…

— Matt Futterman

… before five games flipped it back?

This is the third defeat Sabalenka has suffered in her four most recent Grand Slam finals. Her record of making finals and semifinals at majors is simply extraordinary; her record in getting over the line when she does still needs some work.

She seemed to have got somewhere when she won last year’s U.S. Open, having lost in the Australian Open and French Open finals and the semifinals of Wimbledon. She lost the 2025 Australian Open final to a surging Madison Keys, before combusting against Coco Gauff amid the wind in Paris at Roland Garros.

Then came the WTA Tour Finals final against Rybakina, with a chance to take home $5.3 million. For a third time in four big finals, Sabalenka didn’t show up with her best tennis. Rybakina beat her in straight sets.

Item one on Sabalenka’s 2026 agenda was solving the big final problem. At 3-0 in the final set, she seemed well on her way. Then, Rybakina surged and Sabalenka’s old bad habits emerged — especially a key, hard and low forehand into the net. From the dead, Rybakina reeled off five straight games.

It was the sort of collapse that could add scar tissue to a runaway world No. 1 with one odd problem.

— Matt Futterman

Why was Sabalenka’s fantastic variety such a non-factor?

Midway through the second set, a short slice forced a lunging Sabalenka to hit a drop shot and then rush to the net. She ended up winning the point with a brilliant volley, showcasing the kind of hand skills that first helped her to two doubles Grand Slams, and have since been key to the reinvention of her game over the past two years.

The point was also striking because it stood out against the complete dearth of variety in the first two sets. Sabalenka is far superior to Rybakina in transition and at the net, but for most of the match, she did not get the chance to show it.

Sabalenka’s reluctance to use the drop shot or the slice led to her playing just six net points, of which she won five, in the first two sets. Her tournament average going into the final was 13.5 net points per match. This drop-off was largely a credit to Rybakina, who pinned Sabalenka back with her groundstrokes.

The world No. 1 started to have more success late in the second set, by belatedly inviting Rybakina to transition forward. Rybakina did so down set point in the second set, and sent a volley wide.

Buoyed by the confidence of winning five straight games, Sabalenka used the drop shot for the first time in the match when 3-0 up in the third. It was a beauty, with Rybakina on her heels and unable to retrieve it. Perhaps Sabalenka felt she had to earn the right to start playing with more touch by first getting Rybakina on the back foot.

From there, Sabalenka’s variety largely disappeared and Rybakina won six of the next seven games.

— Charlie Eccleshare

What did Elena Rybakina say?

Speaking in an on-court interview after her win, Rybakina said, “It’s hard to find words but I want to congratulate Aryna for amazing results for a couple of years. I know it’s tough, but I hope we’re going to play many more finals together.

“Thank you so much to Kazakhstan. I felt the support from that corner (pointing behind her) a lot.

“Thank you to my team — without you, it wouldn’t be possible. We had a lot going on and I’m really glad we achieved this result.

“Today, we had a few other matches with Kazakhstan players (including Anna Danilina in the women’s doubles final), and I’m really proud.”

What did Aryna Sabalenka say?

“Honestly, guys, I’m speechless right now,” Sabalenka said in her on-court interview. “I want to start with Elena. I want to congratulate you on an incredible run, incredible tennis.

“I always look forward to coming to play in front of you. Let’s hope next year is going to be a better year for me.”

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