Danielle Collins beats Elena Rybakina for her first WTA 1000 title

American Danielle Collins upset all odds to win the Miami Open title on Saturday, beating Kazakh Elena Rybakina 7-5, 6-3 to win her first WTA 1000 title in her final season on the tour .

Collins, 30, world number 53, is the lowest-ranked woman to win the tournament, winning her biggest career title in two hours.

Collins announced in January that she would retire from the sport at the end of this year and her unexpected run to the final and victory over the world number four delighted the home crowd.

“I couldn’t think of a better way to win my first 1000m title. It means everything to me,” Collins said.

“The encouragement and support I received, it was hard to hide the emotion because I think these are the moments we live for and we don’t always live them. It was really special,” she declared.

3 – Danielle Collins became the third to win a first women’s singles title at the Miami Open after turning 30, after Chris Evert (1986) and Petra Kvitova (2023), since the inaugural event in 1985. Experience.#MiamiOpen | @MiamiOpen @WTA @WTA_insider pic.twitter.com/JAu5tgGPjR

– OptaAce (@OptaAce) March 30, 2024

Although she insists her recent form will not cause her to reconsider leaving the sport, Collins will rise to 22nd in Monday’s WTA rankings.

It was a second consecutive disappointing final loss in Miami for Rybakina, who missed out to Petra Kvitova last year.

Both players looked solid on their serve in the early rallies, but Floridan Collins had to work harder to hold her serve.

She saved four break points while hanging on at 4-3 and again showed resilience to deny a break point at 5-5 with a brilliant backhand winner after a long rally.

Collins broke late in the first set, capitalizing on a third break point to win the set when Rybakina took a long position.

Then the momentum shifted sharply towards Collins when she broke Rybakina’s first service game in the second set.

Rybakina, 24, the 2022 Wimbledon champion, responded by backing down at the first opportunity.

Neither player was able to truly dominate, but Collins delivered the decisive blow when she broke for a 5-3 lead as Rybakina, at full extension on the baseline, was long .

The American had not beaten a top five player since her victory against Paula Badosa, then world number two, in San Diego in October 2022.

It was perhaps inevitable that Collins would show some nerves at the end as she struggled to serve, denying two break points and ultimately clinching her fourth championship point.

Hanging there

“I used to beg my dad to take me here and he would say, ‘You can go when you play in the tournament.'”

Danielle Collins just WON the tournament!#MiamiOpen pic.twitter.com/s2bN4gvGIV

– wta (@WTA) March 30, 2024

“It’s tough,” Collins said. “You have the crowd supporting you and pushing you to finish and they wanted me to win so bad. It was like playing in front of my best friends and I didn’t want to disappoint the audience and it was hard.

“Elena doesn’t give up and she just kept throwing these punches left and right, I just had to hang in there.”

Rybakina had missed Indian Wells due to a gastrointestinal illness and said that with four of her five matches in Miami en route to the final going to three sets, she was not in top shape.

“I felt the body, of course. Also, it wasn’t an easy tournament, because the first matches, I played quite late, I finished, and then I went to sleep around 2:00, 3:00. Then, some matches took place during the day. So the schedule was also variable, and the recovery doesn’t help, that’s for sure,” she said.

“I had a lot of difficult matches. Some of them passed through with a bit of luck. This one didn’t do it, and of course I didn’t expect to be fresh in this final, and she played very well,” she added.

HOW?! 🤯

Danielle Collins | #MiamiOpen pic.twitter.com/hIWktqevrB

– wta (@WTA) March 30, 2024

Collins becomes the first American woman to win the Miami Open title since Sloane Stephens in 2018 and the sixth overall, also joining Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert, three-time champion Venus Williams and eight-time champion Serena Williams.

The previous lowest ranked women’s champion was Kim Clijsters, who was ranked 38th when she won the title in 2005.