Mboko Beat Osaka in a Sensational Canadian open Final

Canadian teenager Victoria Mboko capped off a sensational week at the National Bank Open with a stunning comeback victory over Japan’s Naomi Osaka, rallying for a 2-6, 6-4, 6-1 triumph on Thursday night, Sport360NG reports.

The 18-year-old lifted her maiden WTA Tour trophy, becoming only the third Canadian in the Open era to win the tournament, after Faye Urban in 1969 and Bianca Andreescu in 2019. Her breakthrough will propel her up the world rankings from No. 85 to No. 25.

Mboko collapsed to her knees in celebration after Osaka’s final shot found the net, as an electric Centre Court crowd erupted in deafening cheers, so loud that the chair umpire repeatedly pleaded for silence during points.

The final was a rollercoaster, featuring 13 service breaks across 25 games. Mboko was clinical, converting eight of her nine break chances.

Born in Charlotte, North Carolina, to Congolese parents and raised in Toronto, Mboko’s run included wins over four Grand Slam champions, dispatching top seed Coco Gauff in emphatic fashion before defeating Osaka, Sofia Kenin, and Elena Rybakina on the hard courts.

For Osaka, a four-time major champion and former world No. 1, it was her deepest run at a WTA 1000 event since reaching the Miami Open final in 2022. She took a 15-month break from the tour later that year and welcomed her daughter, Shai, in July 2023. The defeat extends her title drought, with her last triumph coming at the 2021 Australian Open.

Mboko now joins an elite list of wild cards to claim a WTA 1000 title, Maria Sharapova in Cincinnati (2011) and Andreescu in Indian Wells (2019), and becomes the second-lowest-ranked champion of a WTA 1000 or Tier-1 event since the category’s inception in 1990.