Six aces to three: Charaeva beats Rybakina 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in Beijing comeback

Highlights

▶Key

Five points. That is the entire margin by which Alina Charaeva left Beijing with the win — 88 points to 83 — in a match where Elena Rybakina actually won more points on serve, 52 to 47. What Charaeva took instead was the return court, the first-serve battle and, eventually, a 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 comeback in the Round of 64.

Rybakina owned the opening set. She broke Charaeva three times, saved one of the three break points against her, and won 21 service points to Charaeva's 9 on the way to 6-3. Charaeva kept swinging — two aces in the set, as in every set that followed — but the deficit was real.

The second set flipped everything. Rybakina served three double faults, saved zero of the two break points she faced and was broken twice; she broke back once, but 4-6 forced a decider. There, Rybakina's return game vanished — six return points won in the entire set — and although she saved two of three break points, Charaeva converted the one that mattered and never faced a break point on her own serve in closing it 6-3.

Charaeva's win was a study in steadiness. She landed 68% of first serves to Rybakina's 59%, hit six aces at an even two per set against Rybakina's three, and made four double faults to her opponent's seven. She converted five of the eight break points she created and saved two of the six she faced — enough, every time it counted.

Thirteen games to fifteen, 83 points to 88. Charaeva did not blow Rybakina off the court; she simply won the five points tennis asked her to, and in Beijing that was the whole story.