Victoria Mboko Crowned at the Canadian Open after Defeating Naomi Osaka
The young Canadian tennis player Victoria Mboko starred in an impressive victory at the National Bank Open tournament, overcoming a difficult start to defeat the Japanese star Naomi Osaka with scores of 2-6, 6-4, 6-1. Mboko, 18 years old, will rise from 85th to 25th in the world ranking, achieving her first WTA Tour title and joining Faye Urban (1969) and Bianca Andreescu (2019) as the only Canadians to win the Montreal event in the Open era. The excitement erupted when Osaka sent a shot into the net, at which moment Mboko fell to his knees while the audience erupted in jubilation. The winner ran to embrace her family and coaches on the court.The intensity of the crowd forced the referee to repeatedly ask for silence during the points. “It’s been an incredible week here in Montreal,” added Mboko, expressing his affection for the audience in French. After the match, Osaka, who received applause with some boos, responded with a terse “Thank you, I guess”, and did not congratulate Mboko. Subsequently, Osaka declined to speak with the media. The match featured 13 service breaks in 25 games, with Mboko converting 8 out of 9 break points. He achieved this despite playing with an inflamed and stiff wrist, which made movement difficult. After a fall in Wednesday’s semi-final, Mboko went to the hospital for X-rays and an MRI on Thursday morning, receiving clearance to play.“When I had that winning moment and saw so many people standing and cheering me on, it was a surreal experience,” declared Mboko, born in Charlotte, North Carolina, to Congolese parents and raised in Toronto. “I never would have imagined that something like this would come so suddenly. This shows that your dreams are closer than they seem.”
Victoria Mboko
With his wrist bandaged, Mboko committed 13 double faults and the speed of his first serves decreased. In the hard court tournament, she defeated four Grand Slam champions, including Coco Gauff (6-1, 6-4), as well as Osaka, Sofia Kenin, and Elena Rybakina. Osaka, a four-time Grand Slam champion and former world No. 1, achieved her best performance in a WTA 1000 tournament since the Miami final in 2022. She took a 15-month break and had her daughter Shai in July 2023. She hasn’t won a match since the 2021 Australian Open. Mboko is the third wildcard to win a WTA 1000 title, following Maria Sharapova in Cincinnati in 2011 and Andreescu in Indian Wells in 2019. She is the second-lowest ranked player to win a WTA 1000 or Tier-1 title since the Tier-1 category began in 1990.“Today was a very hectic day,” Mboko commented, who often touched her wrist with visible discomfort. “It’s incredible. Words cannot describe how the day was.”
Victoria Mboko
