World No. 1 Elena Rybakina has won the tennis tournament in the Chinese city of Ningbo for the second year in a row. In the final match, the Kazakhstani player was stronger than Canada's Leylah Fernandez – 6:2, 6:2. With the victory, Rybakina defended 500 ranking points from last year and earned $185,500. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Kursiv Media.
The 24-year-old left-hander Fernandez is not the most comfortable opponent for the current tennis queen. Until today, Elena led 3:2 in their head-to-head matches. Moreover, Rybakina won the last two encounters, in Tokyo on hard court and in Stuttgart on clay.
The Kazakhstani took the first set of their sixth meeting in just 37 minutes – 6:3, breaking Leylah's serve in the fifth and seventh games.
In the second set, Rybakina, who clearly outperformed her opponent in almost all aspects of tennis, broke in the third game. She managed to protect it, playing eight points on "more/less" – 3:1. At the end of the set, Elena was unstoppable. 6:2, 6:2 in 1 hour and 16 minutes. Aces – 3:2, double faults – 2:3, total points won – 59:41.
Thus, the world No. 1 from Kazakhstan won the 18th tournament of her career and the fourth of the current season.
The women's hard-court tournament Ningbo Open was founded in 2010. In 2013, the Ningbo Open received "125" status, in 2023 – "250", and in 2024 – "500".
Previously, the tournament was won by Magda Linette (Poland), Ons Jabeur (Tunisia), and Australian Daria Kasatkina, who in 2024 was still playing for Russia.
Last year, the tournament was won by Rybakina, who defeated Russian Ekaterina Alexandrova in the final – 3:6, 6:0, 6:2. This year, Alexandrova reached the quarterfinals, where she lost to future finalist Fernandez – 6:4, 2:6, 1:6.
The total prize fund of Ningbo Open-2026 is $1.2 million. Of this, $185,500 goes to Rybakina and $61,540 to the duo of Desirae Krawczyk (32)/Fanny Stollar (60).
In the doubles final, the American-Hungarian duo defeated Spain's Cristina Bucsa (13) and Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the USA (9) – 7:6 (7:5), 5:7, 10:6. Notably, at the start, Krawczyk and Stollar knocked out the pair of Anna Danilina (Kazakhstan, 7)/Jiang Xinyu (China, 25) – 6:3, 6:4.