Aryna Sabalenka Survives Thrilling Match to Reach US Open Semifinals
Aryna Sabalenka had already bulldozed her way through this US Open draw. On Wednesday night, she had to escape.
The world No.1 came back from the brink against Wimbledon champion Linda Noskova, clawing out a ferocious 7-6(7-1), 3-6, 7-6(10-7) win to reach the semifinals at Flushing Meadows for the sixth year in a row.
For once, the two-time defending champion looked human. Down 2-4 in the deciding set, rattled by double faults and Noskova’s relentless serving, Sabalenka later admitted a thought flashed through her mind: the match was gone.
It wasn’t. Not on this court. Not in this tournament.
A champion pushed to the edge
Noskova arrived as the sixth seed and as Wimbledon’s reigning champion, and she played like it. The Czech unleashed 18 aces, smothered Sabalenka’s return for long stretches and saved seven of nine break points. For nearly three hours she went toe-to-toe with the most imposing ball-striker in the women’s game and, for a while, looked ready to send her home.
Sabalenka struck first, breaking in the second game with a forehand so heavy Noskova didn’t even move for it. That felt like the script: the No.1 imposing herself early, the challenger forced to chase.
Noskova tore it up.
In the ninth game she broke straight back, hammering from the baseline and dragging Sabalenka into longer, more physical exchanges. The set bled into a tiebreak, the kind of high-wire moment Sabalenka has turned into a personal playground this season.
She didn’t blink. She sprinted through the first six points, leaning on the same nerveless, first-strike tennis that helped her reel off a record 21 consecutive tiebreaks at the majors earlier this year. One set on the board, the familiar roar, the familiar swagger.
It didn’t last.
Noskova seizes control
The second set flipped the match on its head. Sabalenka’s firepower dulled; Noskova’s serve sharpened. The Belarusian suddenly struggled to get a proper look at the return, and when she did, errors crept in.
At 3-2 Noskova, the pressure cracked. A double fault from Sabalenka handed the Czech a 4-2 lead, and Noskova didn’t hesitate. She pressed up the court, dictated with her groundstrokes and locked down her delivery. The set slipped away from the defending champion, 6-3, with barely a murmur of resistance.
The momentum stayed with Noskova as the third set began. Sabalenka’s frustration boiled over midway through the decider when a pair of double faults gifted the Czech another break. She screamed into the New York night, her composure fraying as Noskova marched to that 4-2 lead and the edge of a statement upset.
For Noskova, this was the moment. Up a break in the third against the world No.1, serving lights-out, dictating rallies. For Sabalenka, it was survival.
The fightback
What followed was the kind of stubborn, defiant surge that separates serial champions from everyone else.
Sabalenka loosened her shoulders. The desperation that had tightened her swing gave way to the freedom of a player who, by her own admission, thought the match might already be gone. She began to go after her shots again, stepping inside the baseline, ripping through forehands instead of guiding them.
The break back came in the eighth game. Noskova, so composed for so long, finally wobbled. Sabalenka pounced, reclaiming the break and dragging the contest to its inevitable conclusion: another tiebreak, under the lights, with everything on the line.
Once more, the big-stage instincts kicked in. Sabalenka owned the decisive breaker, leaning on her serve, taking the ball early, refusing to let Noskova breathe. At 9-7, she found one last ace, a clean strike to seal a match that had tested every part of her game and temperament.
She soaked in the roar, then turned the spotlight back on her opponent and the crowd, calling it “a battle” and admitting she had pushed herself “to the limit” to get through. The numbers back that up: she has now won 21 of her past 22 matches at the US Open, and this one demanded more than most.
Chasing Serena’s shadow
By reaching the semifinals for the sixth straight year, Sabalenka has stepped into rare air. Only Serena Williams had previously put together such a run in New York in the modern era, from 2011 to 2016, a stretch that yielded three of her six US Open titles.
Sabalenka is still chasing that kind of legacy, but the pattern is unmistakable. Flushing Meadows is her territory now. She is two wins away from a third consecutive crown, and she’s doing it with the same ferocity, the same uncompromising power game, but now with an extra layer of resilience that nights like this demand.
Her next assignment will come against the winner of the all-American clash between Jessica Pegula and Emma Navarro. Different styles, different threats, but one simple reality: whoever emerges will have to walk into a stadium where Sabalenka has turned survival into habit and pressure into fuel.
On this evidence, it will take more than a one-break lead in the third set to knock her off her throne.
