Seventeen-year-old Mirra Andreeva made history on the hallowed hard centre court at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships on Friday, beating World No7 Elena Rybakina 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 to become the youngest player to reach a WTA 1000 final.
Having defeated 2022 Dubai finalist Marketa Vondrousova in the second round and World No2 Iga Swiatek in the quarterfinals this week, Andreeva also becomes the youngest player to beat three Grand Slam champions in a single tournament since Maria Sharapova in 2004.
Andreeva had trailed 3-1 in the third set before winning the last five games to reach only her third tour-level final. She won the WTA 250 Iasi Open last July in Romania, before losing the WTA 500 final in Ningbo, China, three months later. In Dubai on Saturday night, she will face Denmark’s Clara Tauson, who will also be appearing in her first WTA 1000 final. Something has got to give.
“Honestly, it’s crazy because at first I was not very positive before coming to Dubai,” said Andreeva, who becomes only the third teenager to reach a WTA 1000 final since the format’s inception in 2009. “I was like: ‘Okay, well, I’m just going to play’. As always, when you don’t think about how you’re going to play, you just play your best tennis and in the end it’s one of your best tournaments. I’m just really happy with the way I played and really happy to be playing my first finals.”
The first set featured few extended rallies, but Andreeva held her own against the 2022 Wimbledon champion, breaking her opponent’s serve for 3-2 before immediately completing an unwanted trio of double faults to surrender her advantage. She broke again to reestablish the lead for 4-3 and this time held serve to close out the set.
In the second set, Rybakina levelled the tie with the help of a solid, flaw-free service game, before racing into a 3-1 lead in the final set. Yet Andreeva, playing with nothing to lose, found momentum when Rybakina missed the chance to go 4-1 up. Just as she did in her quarterfinal with Swiatek, she won the last five games of the match to take the victory and make history.
“For now, I’m just trying not to think about that at all,” she replied when asked how she feels to be a WTA 1000 finalist two months before her 18th birthday. “When I didn’t think about my results and about what’s going to happen, I reached the final, so if I start thinking about ‘what if I can, ‘what if I cannot’, ‘what if I’m able, what if I’m not able’, then those thoughts are going to kill me.”
Andreeva’s opponent on the other side of the net on Saturday evening will be Tauson, who battled for almost three hours against Karolina Muchova before emerging victorious 6-4, 6-7(4), 6-3. Like Andreeva, the unseeded Dane will be playing her first WTA 1000 final having beaten, among others, two-time Dubai champion Elina Svitolina and World No1 Aryna Sabalenka on route to the final.
Against Muchova in Friday’s evening match, Tauson flew out the blocks to immediately break her opponent’s serve and although her Czech opponent levelled the set at 4-4, the World No38-ranked Dane recovered to break back without dropping a point before successfully holding serve for the set. With both players playing solidly, the second set went with serve before Muchova edged the tiebreak.
In the third set, Muchova took the outright lead for the first time in the third game but failed to capitalise as her opponent levelled instantly. The Czech star, seeded 14th here this week, must have thought it was her night when she played an outrageous winner through the legs, but Tauson showed she is made of sterner stuff and broke for 5-3. Despite double-faulting at match-point, she closed out the win at the second attempt when Muchova’s forehand flew long.
“I’ve never played so many matches in a row, so we’ll see how I wake up,” said Tauson. “I’m going to try my best to keep it together for the final. I’ll have to give the physios a big gift when I’m done here because they’ve been working with me since the first round to try to keep me together.”
Against Andreeva, Tauson considers herself the underdog, which could work to her benefit given her opponent’s preference to play as if she has nothing to lose. “I think we’re both going to be nervous as it’s a big final, but she’s obviously the favourite now,” said Tauson, who is ranked 24 places below World No14 Andreeva in the WTA rankings. “I was the favourite in the first round and then I haven’t been the favourite since, so it’s fine. She has to beat me; the pressure is on her.”
The 25th edition of the annual WTA 1000 event is running until February 22, before the 33rd staging of Dubai’s ATP Tour 500 tournament takes place from February 24 to March 1. Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships is owned and organised by Dubai Duty Free and held under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.
tanvir@dubainewsweek.com
