Aryna Sabalenka Conquers the US Open and Demonstrates Resilience After a Year of Challenges
In January, after the Australian Open final, Aryna Sabalenka, visibly frustrated, smashed her racket on the court. Madison Keys had caused the upset, and Sabalenka was left at the gates of her third consecutive Grand Slam title. Sabalenka’s disappointment spread around the world through the screens. Months later, in the Roland Garros final, Sabalenka fell again, this time to Coco Gauff. The Belarusian tennis player’s anger was evident, both in her post-match speech and in the press conference, both moments went viral for the wrong reasons. Weeks later, at Wimbledon, Amanda Anisimova eliminated her in the semifinals in an exciting three-set match. Sabalenka left the court, and the tournament, dejected and confused. Despite having been the world number 1 for the entire season and having won two level 1000 titles, she failed to prevail in the key moments. She took some time off from tennis to reset and learn from everything that happened. Sabalenka, 27, arrived in New York hungry, even desperate, to redeem her year and close her Grand Slam season defending her title. On Saturday, all the tough losses and the agony of defeat she had felt during the season were worth it. Jason Stacy, her performance coach, revealed that Sabalenka began reading the motivational book “Into the Magic Shop” after Roland Garros. He called it a “fairy tale,” and in New York, she had her own fairy tale ending. Facing Anisimova again, but this time before a crowd mostly in favor of the American at Arthur Ashe Stadium, Sabalenka was crowned with her fourth Grand Slam title.
“Those two finals where I completely lost control over my emotions, I just didn’t want this to happen again,” said a radiant Sabalenka shortly after during an interview on the ESPN broadcast. “And there were some moments when I was about to let it go. But I said, ‘Come on. You can’t do that. You just have to stay focused and keep going, keep trying.’ And it really helped me.”
Aryna Sabalenka
But Sabalenka, like so many tennis players, is a perfectionist by nature. She knows how good she can be when she is at her best and has worked tirelessly to bring her game to an elite level. When she struggled with her serve in 2022, something that became so detrimental on the court that she considered retiring, she hired a biomechanics expert to help her overcome it and refine her service motion. For many years, she worried about taking too much time off, something almost impossible in the grueling WTA calendar, and demanded a lot of herself when she returned to practice if there was any sign of rust.
That dedication has led her to amazing success. Since reaching her first Grand Slam semifinal at Wimbledon in 2021, after having changed her focus exclusively to singles at the beginning of that year, despite many encouraging her to continue with both, Sabalenka has been arguably the most consistent player on the circuit. After controlling her service problems the following year, she has reached the quarterfinals or better in every Grand Slam she has played and has advanced to four of the last five finals and the previous six hard court finals. She has held the number 1 position since October and has shown few signs of relinquishing it. But with all that, a very high level of expectation has arrived, and even more pressure has been put on. Not achieving what she knows she is capable of has led to collapses, such as the broken racket in Melbourne, as well as her speech and comments in Paris. After her 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-4 defeat to Gauff in the French Open final, Sabalenka was in tears and then blamed the gusting wind for her performance. “The conditions were terrible, and she was just better in these conditions than me,” Sabalenka told reporters. “I think it was the worst final I’ve played.” Sabalenka was immediately labeled a bad loser, and some of her other comments about Gauff were even worse received by the public. (She later apologized, and Gauff kindly accepted). Sabalenka and her team then focused on the challenge of how Sabalenka could find a way to win when she wasn’t playing her best game or the conditions weren’t ideal. Max Mirnyi, former world No. 1 doubles player and six-time Grand Slam doubles champion from Belarus, joined Sabalenka’s team before the hard court season, and has continued to reiterate that lesson during their time together.“One of my main starting points when joining the team and sometimes speaking directly with Aryna is to convey the message that there is no such thing as the perfect tennis match,” Mirnyi said on Friday. “Perfection doesn’t exist on a tennis court. You can take the best matches of [[Novak] Djokovic and [Roger] Federer or Steffi Graf… there will always be things that didn’t go as planned, and it’s the best champions who know how to respond and adapt in the moment, on the fly.”
Max Mirnyi
With two breaks up in the second set and with a clear advantage for the victory, Sabalenka struggled to close the match. Serving at 5-4 and only two points away from the trophy, Sabalenka hit what should have been an easy lob over the net. She dropped her racket to the ground in apparent disbelief. Anisimova then won the next point to get the break and level the set at 5-all.
Sabalenka admitted to reporters that she almost “lost it” after the missed shot, but found a way to maintain composure. “You can’t make these kinds of mistakes at important points,” he said. “Sometimes it can be crucial, from my experience. So yes, that was the moment, but then I turned around and took a deep breath and said: ‘Okay, it happens. It’s over. Let’s focus on the next one.'” Two games later and a tiebreak ensued. But instead of sinking under the pressure, Sabalenka, who had won her previous 19 tiebreaks, took control. Although she needed three match points, and exhaled deeply before each one, the outcome hardly seemed in doubt, and the extra points were just a mere formality. After being first announced as the 2025 US Open champion, Sabalenka turned to her team in her box. While many players run off the court and up the stairs, as Sabalenka has done previously, she took her time, walking and high-fiving fans before embracing each member of her coaching team, as well as her agent and friends. “It’s been a difficult year with those finals,” Sabalenka said moments later during the trophy presentation as she addressed her team. “I was very terrible to you, but come on. It’s worth it, right? Thank you very much. I love you. You are my family.” With thousands of fans watching during her television interview, Sabalenka said she was going to have a few drinks at the bar on site to start her celebration because, “You have to enjoy it” after all the hard work. As she spoke, and the smile continued to radiate on her face, it became clear that, as devastating as the previous defeats in the final were at that moment, they made Saturday’s triumph even sweeter. And as she looked at Anisimova’s stunned face, stained with her own tears after losing in her second consecutive Grand Slam final, while she was on stage holding her runner-up trophy, Sabalenka couldn’t help but convey that feeling. “I know how much it hurts to lose in the finals,” Sabalenka said as she turned and looked at Anisimova. “But believe me, the moment you win the first one, and you will win it… you will enjoy it even more after all the tough defeats in the finals.”
