Leylah Fernandez has collected the biggest title of her career at the DC Open with her most lopsided victory of the tournament, defeating Anna Kalinskaya 6-1 6-2 in the final.
The left-handed Fernandez, a 22-year-old from Canada who is ranked 36th, earned her fourth singles trophy – all have come at hard-court tournaments – and first at a WTA 500 event.
She came close to a Grand Slam championship as a teenager at the 2021 US Open, making it all the way to the final in New York before losing to Emma Raducanu.
There almost was a rematch in Washington, but Kalinskaya eliminated Raducanu in Saturday’s semi-finals.
The 48th-ranked Kalinskaya had not dropped a set all week until Sunday’s final.
However, she wasn’t able to keep up with Fernandez, who saved the only two break points she faced while taking four of Kalinskaya’s service games in a match that lasted 1 hour 10 minutes.
It was Fernandez’s first title since winning in at the Hong Kong Open in October 2023.
She arrived in Washington with a losing record this season and hadn’t won more than two matches at the same tournament since last November.
With a mix of baseline excellence and strong net play, Fernandez eliminated top-seeded Jessica Pegula, the US Open runner-up last year, and No.3 seed Elena Rybakina, Wimbledon champion in 2022, on the way to the final.
The win against Rybakina in Saturday’s semi-finals took three tiebreakers and more than three hours to decide.
There was no such drama against Kalinskaya, a 26-year-old Russian who fell to 0-3 in tour-level finals. She lost to Jasmine Paolini in Dubai and to Pegula in Berlin last year.
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