Rybakina Upsets Aryna Sabalenka to Secure Historic £4 Million Prize
Elena Rybakina secured her forty-fifth hard court victory of 2025
Rybakina won the biggest reward in WTA history by beating world number one Sabalenka in two sets at the championship.
The 26-year-old produced a brilliant display to beat four-times major champion Sabalenka in two sets in Saudi Arabia.
Since each competitor came through the competition without a loss, the purse on offer was a unprecedented £3.98m – the highest payout offering in WTA the sport's history.
The reward exceeds the £3.74m the Belarusian earned for claiming September's New York major, which was the highest-paying Grand Slam in the current year.
"This has been an fantastic week," stated the Kazakh player.
"I honestly couldn't have predicted any result so to reach the final was just remarkable."
"Let me offer congratulations to Sabalenka for being number one for a second consecutive year running, it's an tremendous accomplishment."
The champion, who was the world number six, hit 16 winning shots during a dominant first-set performance.
The 2022 Wimbledon winner fended off a couple of chances before taking every point in the sixth game to go a break up and held her serve to seal the opening set.
With the second set on serve, the world number one saved another two opportunities at four-all to shift the balance in her favor.
However, having worked so hard to disrupt her opponent's flow, the top seed let her opponent off the hook by wasting a pair of set points in the following game to level the second set at five-all.
Sabalenka's failure to force a decider affected her tiebreak play, with the Kazakh winning all seven points to claim the title.
The victory, her sixth triumph over her rival, means Rybakina will move up one place in the rankings to number five in the world.
A distraught Sabalenka was seen crying as she met with her coaching team soon after the match.
"It was not the finest performance from me in this match but Elena you were definitely the superior player," Sabalenka told the crowd.
"You really overpowered me out of the court. I'm happy to see you play your best tennis. Celebrate this stunning trophy."
