Elina Svitolina recovered from a second-set tie-breaker loss and went on to defeat Coco Gauff, 6-4, 6-7 (3), 6-2 on Saturday to win her third Italian Open championship in Rome.
The 31-year-old Ukrainian became the second woman age 30-plus to take the WTA 1000 title in the Italian capital. Serena Williams won three after she turned 30 in 2013-14 and 2016.
Svitolina, who was seeded seventh in the tournament, won back-to-back Italian Open titles in 2017-18 and her win on Saturday was the 20th in her career.
“It’s very hard to believe that it’s been eight years since I held this trophy,” said Svitolina on-court after the match. “Very, very pleased with the two weeks here. I want to say congrats to Coco for a great tournament and for your team as well. You’re such a great champion. Hopefully we’ll have more battles in the future.”
“I want to thank my team. I had a tough loss in the final in Dubai this year. It was my 19th title and I was aiming for 20. I told my coach it would be nice before I finish my career to have a round number.”
The third-seeded Gauff broke her foe’s serve out of the gates and led, 4-2, before Svitolina rallied to win the next four games to capture the set. She saved 8-of-10 break points, while Gauff conceded all three break points on her shaky service.
The two women held serve for the first ten games of the second set. Then, there were back-to-back breaks, with Gauff failing to hold at 6-5. But she won all five points on serve during the tie-breaker and tallied the final six points to send the match to a decider.
The Floridian had one break point chance at 2-1, but Svitolina responded and captured 17 of the next 24 points of the match to take a 5-2 lead.
Ever the fighter, Gauff dug in, earning three break points and fending off two match points before Svitolina won her first WTA 1000 title since 2018.
She defeated the No. 2 seed Elena Rybakina (quarterfinals) and No. 4 seed Iga Swiatek (semifinals) to reach the big stage in Rome.
Ukrainian women swept the clay court WTA 1000 events in 2026, as Marta Kostyuk captured the 2026 title in Madrid last month.
–Field Level Media
