World No. 1 Elena Rybakina won the BNB Ningbo Open for the second year running on Sunday, 25 October, beating Canada's Leylah Fernandez 6-2 6-2 in 1 hour 16 minutes. It is her fourth title of 2026, the most of any player this season, and the first time in her career that she has successfully defended a title.
A final without a break point against her
Rybakina broke Fernandez twice in each set and never lost her own serve, according to the WTA's match report. Ubitennis counted 25 winners from the Kazakh and four break points converted out of five. After a week in which she dropped only one set, against Katarzyna Kawa in the quarter-finals, she said the final was her best performance of the tournament.
"Ningbo is already a special place," Rybakina told reporters after the match, recalling that her strong end to 2025 also began there, when she beat Mirra Andreeva in the final. She has now won all eight matches she has played in Ningbo.
Four titles, 53 wins and a changed record in finals
The numbers from the WTA show how far Rybakina's season has gone. Ningbo follows her titles at the Australian Open, Stuttgart and the US Open, and brings her career total to 15 titles, nine of them on hard courts. It is also her seventh WTA 500 title. Her win over Fernandez was her 53rd match win of the season, three more than Mirra Andreeva and Jessica Pegula.
Finals used to be a problem for her. Rybakina has now reached 28 tour-level finals and has won 11 of the last 15, a change she spoke about after the match: she said she used to get "very upset" about losing finals and that "now it's going my way". She also leads Fernandez 4-2 in their head-to-head after a third straight win.
Fernandez, a former US Open finalist, still ends the Asian swing in form. She has won 13 of her last 17 matches, and her run in Ningbo included wins over Ekaterina Alexandrova and Marie Bouzkova. "We're having a good end of year," she said, as reported by Ubitennis.
Siniakova wins in Osaka
On the same day in Osaka, Katerina Siniakova beat American Ashlyn Krueger 6-1 6-0 to win the Japan Open. It is the sixth singles title of the Czech player's career and her first since Nanchang in 2023, completed in 68 minutes according to Tennis Majors. Siniakova, better known as a doubles champion, has now won all five of her matches against Krueger. Krueger won this tournament in 2023. Ten years ago Siniakova lost the Osaka final to Christina McHale; she is now the first Czech champion in the event's history.
What comes next
Rybakina and Fernandez are both entered in next week's Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo, the last WTA 500 event of the season, before the WTA Finals. Rybakina is on an eight-match winning streak going into it. The latest positions are on our WTA rankings page.
Sources
This article was written by TiebreakNews from the reporting below, checked against official results and rankings.
- WTA — By the Numbers: Rybakina wins Ningbo Open for tour-leading fourth title of season
- Ubitennis — Elena Rybakina Cruises To Tour-Leading Fourth Title Of 2026 At Ningbo Open
- WTA — Siniakova wins Osaka final to claim sixth career title
- Tennis Majors — Siniakova crushes Krueger to become the first Czech champion in Osaka, ten years after losing the final