Leylah Fernandez and Diana Shnaider will meet in an all-left-handed final at the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo on Sunday, 1 November. In Guangzhou, British qualifier Harriet Dart reached the first WTA final of her career and will play Austria's Lilli Tagger for the title.
Fernandez keeps winning
Fernandez beat lucky loser Kamilla Rakhimova 7-5 6-3 to reach the 11th final of her career, Tennis Now reported. The Canadian, who went through to the semi-finals when world No. 1 Elena Rybakina withdrew with a neck problem, has won 16 of her last 20 matches. That run includes the Ningbo final, which she lost to Rybakina last Sunday, and she will be playing for the seventh title of her career.
Shnaider, the third seed, needed two tight sets to beat 18-year-old wild card Mia Pohankova 6-4 7-6(7). She came back from 2-4 down in the first set against Pohankova, who had beaten Naomi Osaka and Alycia Parks earlier in the week. It is Shnaider's first final of the season, a day after she came back to beat Alexandra Eala 2-6 7-6(5) 6-4, and she will be chasing a sixth career title. She has the edge in her head-to-head with Fernandez, having won their last three meetings, according to Tennis Now.
Dart's comeback in Guangzhou
In Guangzhou, the 30-year-old Dart, who came through qualifying, beat 16-year-old Chinese wild card Sun Xinran, this year's US Open junior champion, 5-7 7-6(1) 6-0 in 2 hours 30 minutes. Dart saved match points while serving to stay in the match at 4-5 in the second set, won the tie-break 7-1 and did not lose a game in the third. "To finally be here means the world," she said, as reported by Tennis Majors.
Her opponent will be Lilli Tagger, the fourth seed, who needed only 52 minutes to beat Kaitlin Quevedo 6-2 6-0. The Austrian teenager, who won her first WTA title in Prague this year, held all seven of her service games without facing a break point and won every point on her first serve. It will be the first meeting between Dart and Tagger.
The last tournaments before the WTA Finals
Tokyo and Guangzhou are among the last events before the WTA Finals in Indian Wells (8–15 November). Both finals are played on Sunday, 1 November. Follow the scores on our tennis results page and the latest positions on our WTA rankings page.
Sources
This article was written by TiebreakNews from the reporting below, checked against official results and rankings.
- Tennis Now — Shnaider Will Play Fernandez for Tokyo Title
- Tennis Majors — Qualifier Harriet Dart meets teenager Lilli Tagger for the Guangzhou title
- WTA — Dart saves two match points to beat Sun, reach first WTA singles final in Guangzhou