Leylah Fernández and Emma Raducanu, the US Open final: first step to the legend or another brief post pass?

09/10/2021 20:15

• Clarín.com

• sports

Updated 09/10/2021 20:15

Canadian

Leylah Fernandez, 19,

and

Britain's

Emma Raducanu, just 18,

will play

the second-youngest final in

history at the US Open

this Saturday

.

The first dates from 1999 and was between two players who would eventually become legend: the American Serena Williams and the Swiss Martina Hingis, who were 17 and 18 years old at the time, respectively.

The long-awaited final, which will begin at 5:20 p.m. (Argentina time) at the Arthur Ashe Stadium, center court of Flushing Meadows, will be televised on the ESPN screen.

The road to the United States Open was long, and to reach this stage they had to beat great candidates in the semifinals.

On the side of Fernández, she won 7-6, 4-6, 6-4, against Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka, who is ranked number two in the WTA ranking, in a match that lasted two hours and 21 minutes, while Raducanu She did it against the Greek and seventeenth favorite, Maria Sakkari, winning 6-1, 6-4 in a time of one hour and 23 minutes.

Canadian Leylah Fernandez reacts after winning her semi-final match.

Photo: Ed Jones / AFP

The US Open is a competition that always leaves surprises and bumps among the players and one of them was Leyla's victory

over the current champion and winner also in 2018

, the Japanese Naomi Osaka, number three in the ranking, in the instances to advance to Round of 16, which created extra motivation for him to be in the fight for the title today.

The Canadian was not the only one to surprise in the competition.

Raducanu was not far behind and was leaving rivals along the way without having given up a single set, among them the flaming Swiss Olympic champion

Belinda Bencic

, a triumph that assured him the passage to the semifinals, where he continued with his devastating march.

Their performances are already legendary.

A great mystery remains to be unveiled because in any case this result will catapult one

into the eternal history

of the Grand Slams: what does the future hold?

Emma Raducanu from Great Britain smiles during a training session.

Photo: Matthew Stockman / AFP

Or rather: can they rise steadily, as did the other adolescents who defined the title, those little Serena and Martina?

Women's tennis needs it, it needs figures to take over the scene, even if it is not going to happen (it would be too pretentious) what Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer achieved in the ATP.

Osaka seems to go that way

, having won four in the same number of seasons, but the rest, with the tepid glimpse of

Ashleigh Barty

, can't seem to keep up: counting this one,

the last 20 Majors will have had 14 different champions

and Any of the leaders in the ranking seems in a position to lose to any rival.

Fernández and Raducanu make sure that the focus does not go there, anyway, at least for these hours.

But they are excited about their game and promise to be stars.

This Saturday they are on

the first big step of their professional lives

and regardless of what happens in the future,

winning the US Open will be something that they can never take away from them.

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