Rome: Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina won the Italian Open when Ukrainian opponent Anhelina Kalinina retired due to a left thigh injury early in the second set of the rain-delayed final on Saturday.
Rybakina was leading 6-4, 1-0 (15-0) when Kalinina called for a trainer and grasped her left leg as she teared up. She then decided she couldn’t continue. The final began at almost 11 p.m. on Saturday and ended just after midnight on Sunday.
“I’m really sorry that I couldn’t play,” Kalinina said during the trophy ceremony as the crowd whistled after waiting under the rain for hours before the night session started. “I was trying to do my best.”
Holger Rune will face Daniil Medvedev in the men’s final on Sunday.
The 20-year-old Rune rallied past Casper Ruud 6-7 (2), 6-4, 6-2 and Medvedev performed a little celebratory dance after beating Stefanos Tsitsipas 7-5, 7-5 in a semifinal that was suspended twice in the first set for a total of nearly 4 hours due to rain.
Rybakina earned her biggest tournament win on clay. Her only other title on the surface was in Bucharest in 2019.
It’s been quite a year for Rybakina, who reached the final of the Australian Open, also won an elite title in Indian Wells and was the runner-up in Miami. On Monday, she’ll move up to a career-high No. 4 in the rankings and will be considered a contender at the French Open, which starts next weekend. The 47th-ranked Kalinina was playing in the biggest final of her career, and has been dedicating her performances to her war-torn country.
Kalinina’s family home was destroyed in a Russian attack last year. Also, her elderly grandparents have had to relocate from the southern city of Nova Kakhovka which is held by Russian forces to Kyiv. Kalinina’s parents work as tennis coaches in Kyiv and she said on Friday there was a “huge, huge bomb near them, near their academy” a few days ago.
Rybakina was born in Moscow and has represented Kazakhstan since 2018, when that country offered funding to support her tennis career.
Kalinina spent more than four hours longer on court than Rybakina entering the final, having won the longest match on the women’s circuit this season 3 hours, 41 minutes against Beatriz Haddad Maia in the quarterfinals. She also required three sets to beat Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova in an emotionally charged semifinal.
Rune, who eliminated six-time Rome champion Novak Djokovic in the quarterfinals, improved to 7-1 in his career against players ranked in the top five. “I play some of my best tennis when I play the top guys of the world,” Rune said. “You need it against those players.”
Making the final marked quite a turnaround for Medvedev, who lost his opening match in Rome in his three previous appearances.