American Amanda Anisimova took down Aryna Sabalenka — the top-ranked ladies’s participant on the planet — in three units within the Wimbledon semifinals on Thursday.
Anisimova received the match 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, and can now play the winner of Iga Swiatek and Belinda Bencic within the Wimbledon closing on Saturday.
Anisimova, the thirteenth seed within the ladies’s bracket, has by no means performed in a Grand Slam closing. Her greatest end at a slam earlier than this yr was an look within the French Open semis in 2019.
“This doesn’t really feel actual proper now, truthfully,” Anisimova stated throughout an on-court interview after the match. “Aryna is such a troublesome competitor and I used to be completely dying on the market. I don’t understand how I pulled it out.”
Final yr, Anisimova didn’t make it past the qualifying rounds at Wimbledon. Her greatest end on the All-England Membership got here in 2022, when she made it to the quarterfinals.
After ending 2024 because the Thirty sixth-ranked participant in ladies’s tennis, Anisimova has put collectively her greatest season as knowledgeable, successful her first WTA 1000 title earlier this yr. She entered July ranked twelfth, the best rating of her profession.
Sabalenka, in the meantime, fell simply wanting Wimbledon’s closing spherical for the third time within the final 5 years. Sabalenka has misplaced within the Wimbledon semis in 2021, 2023 and now 2025.
After successful the Australian Open and U.S. Open final yr, Sabalenka misplaced within the first two Grand Slam finals of 2025 earlier than bowing out within the semis Thursday.
If Anisimova wins the Wimbledon closing on Saturday, she’s going to turn into the third totally different American lady to win a Grand Slam this yr after Madison Keys received the Australian Open and Coco Gauff received the French.
Anisimova, 23, is the youngest American lady to make the Wimbledon closing since Serena Williams in 2004.
