When the WTA Madrid Open draw was announced last Monday, 20 April, all eyes were on the bigger names.
A New Finalist At Madrid Is Confirmed
The Draw
What was Aryna Sabalenka‘s route to the final? Could she become the first woman since Iga Swiatek in 2022 to win three straight WTA 1000 events and the first to do so across two surfaces since Serena Williams in 2013? Would Elena Rybakina keep the excellent form that has propelled her to #2 in the rankings and top of the race to the WTA Finals? Would Swiatek and Coco Gauff rediscover their form on the clay a month shy of Roland Garros? Either way, there was a height of anticipation around the first WTA 1000 clay court event of the season.
The bottom half, in particular, owned some very spicy potential match-ups. Jessica Pegula, Viktoria Mboko and Coco Gauff all fell in the same quarter, while Elena Rybakina seemingly had the whole bottom quarter to herself due to the late withdrawal of Amanda Anisimova. Yet, as is so often proved in tennis, matches aren’t won on paper. And on this Tuesday afternoon, a day before the bottom half of the quarterfinals take place, none of these names will be taking to court tomorrow.
Shocks Galore
There have been some mitigating circumstances. Coco Gauff has struggled with sickness all week and admitted after her last 32 victory over Sorana Cirstea that she didn’t “know how” she lasted a match during which she threw up off court between the sets. The reward was a battle against Linda Noskova in the next round. The 21-year-old has enjoyed an impressive past year, making the semifinals of Indian Wells and finals in Tokyo (albeit retiree-assisted) and Prague. She showed no fear against last year’s runner-up, recovering from a second-set setback, as well as being 4-2 down in the deciding tiebreak, to claim her first top ten win of 2026.
Pegula continued her underwhelming start to the season with a 6-1 6-4 loss to Marta Kostyuk. The Ukrainian is on an eight-match winning streak after lifting the title in Rouen. More to the point, she is 12-1 against players not named Elena Rybakina and Aryna Sabalenka this season. Still just 23, she has propelled herself into a different conversation of player. Her power hitting is a sight to watch and if she can stay fully fit, you’d have to say her trajectory is only heading one way and that is up.
Rybakina had to fight in her opening two rounds, needing three sets to beat both Elena-Gabriela Ruse and Qinwen Zheng but after that, you fully expected her to kick on and make a run to another final. Instead, she faced lucky loser Anastasia Potapova, who was only in the draw due to the withdrawal of 2025 Australian Open champion Madison Keys. And the tennis world watched on in a state of shock as the world#56 beat the Kazakhstani in straight sets to set up a quarterfinal tie with Karolina Pliskova.
You can’t even say that Rybakina played a poor match. Potapova simply played one of the matches of her career, playing with a red line aggression in the first set tiebreak, particularly excelling on the backhand wing and won 10-8. In the second set, Rybakina forced a break and led 4-2. Another three-set win seemed on the cards. Yet, her opponent dug in to win four straight games and became the first person other than Aryna Sabalenka to get a straight sets win over the world #2 since Iga Swiatek last August.
The Remaining Four
So, it means that in the bottom half of the draw, either Kostyuk, Noskova, Pliskova or Potapova will reach their first final. Who will do it? It remains tough to call.
If all are on form, you’d expect it to be Kostyuk. Her bulldozing style of play suits the high altitude courts of Madrid and she has shown already this season that she is capable of turning up the heat at the back end of tournaments. Yet, with just five tournaments played this year, there remains a relatively small sample size. So, it’s impossible to back her with certainty.
Yet, her quarterfinal opponent, Noskova, will be right with her if she doesn’t find her A-game. The Czech is an astute on-court tactician and can find bursts of match-to-match consistency. However, against big hitters like Kostyuk, she has generally struggled so far in her young career.
After recording one of the biggest wins of her career, Potapova’s task is to back that result up with a win over Karolina Pliskova. It can so often prove a tricky task due to the mental and physical energy exerted in a shock victory. In compairson, Pliskova, a former #1, has become the lowest ever-ranked player to make the quarterfinals. The fast conditions suit her big serve and with momentum on her side, she will be feeling confident of making her first WTA 1000 final since in Rome five years ago.
Overall, my money would be on Kostyuk to make her second final this season and set up a rematch with Aryna Sabalenka, but whoever it turns out to be, it’ll prove a wonderful story in the Spanish capital.
