“I don’t think either of us likes to defend,” Elena Rybakina said ahead of her eleventh clash with Aryna Sabalenka on the WTA tour. And honestly, that one line sums up their rivalry to perfection. Two of the biggest hitters in the women’s game, Rybakina and Sabalenka, have built their reputation on raw power and fearless striking. So when they met in the quarterfinals of the Berlin Open on Friday, it was always going to be fireworks. And they delivered exactly that, leaving even the Belarusian teetering on the edge.
The opening set couldn’t separate the two and needed a tiebreaker to settle the score. It was the World No.1 who edged it, clinching the set 8-6 in the breaker. But that was just the start of the drama.
Rybakina, who’s no stranger to turning things around, came storming back in the second. She took the set 6-3 with little resistance, putting Sabalenka on the back foot and leveling the match.
The decider was a proper tug-of-war. Both players broke each other’s serves and refused to let the other settle. One particularly intense point saw Aryna Sabalenka charge forward, only to lose her footing and crash to the grass.
Rybakina just broke Sabalenka’s ankles pic.twitter.com/ztAfYvB1Tg
— CATweets (@CAme_Tweets) June 20, 2025
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