How Amanda Anisimova is putting the tennis world on notice

The 23-year-old’s road to the biggest title of her career included three-set wins over both Karolina Muchova and Jasmine Paolini, but she routed compatriot and defending champion Coco Gauff, 6-1, 6-2 in the semifinals. She became only the third American to make the Beijing final after Serena Williams and Gauff and even though she sits behind Gauff in the WTA rankings, one could argue that she’s the No. 1 American on tour right now.

What’s even more impressive is that Anisimova has been able to put her 6-0, 6-0 Wimbledon final loss to Iga Swiatek and her straight-sets defeat to Aryna Sabalenka in the U.S. Open championship in the backburner. Sure, a double bagel loss is gut-wrenching and puts you as a trivia fact, but to have two back-to-back Grand Slam final losses where your run up until the end were impressive just to falter? That can leave a lot of scar tissue. Instead, she blasted 36 winners in the championship match, led by the backhand that many on tour say is the best shot in the women’s game.

Beijing was Anisimova’s first tennis since New York and though she’s been dealing with some injury and a recent tooth extraction, I’m most impressed with her mental fortitude to leave the past in the past. When she took a mental health sabbatical, many people wondered if she would produce the same tennis she once did, let alone even come back. Now, because of it, she’s inserting herself into the “Big 2/3/4” conversation with the consistency at the world’s biggest events. More players are starting to take a page and either cut their season early or take a break altogether.

Anisimova is putting the world on notice, just in time. She’s starting to insert herself as one of the contenders for the WTA Finals trophy next month, then who knows? She doesn’t have many points to defend in Australia and she could leave Melbourne potentially contending for the No. 1 ranking.

To me, she’s been the revelation of the 2025 season and to be honest, I think she’s just getting started.

On to links!

This Week in Women’s Tennis

Amanda Anisimova and Madison Keys have both qualified for the WTA Finals – marking the debut for Anisimova and Keys’ first qualification since 2016. They now make it three Americans to battle it out in Riyadh next month. The battle for the remaining spots continues on.

There were three WTA 125 events held the second week of Beijing with Viktorija Golubic (Suzhou), Kaja Juvan (Samsun) and Sara Bejlek (Rende) claiming the singles titles.

Daria Kasatkina is ending her season early following a mentally taxing season that included a country switch on top of the effects the Russia-Ukraine war has had on her family:

A career breakthrough WTA 1000 followed by back-to-back Grand Slam finals and a debut WTA Finals berth. Sound familiar? This year, Amanda Anisimova is taking a page from the Jasmine Paolini playbook.

Aryna Sabalenka has been the queen of the Wuhan Open and she’s eager to continue her hardcourt domination.

Donna Vekic opened up about the changes to her team and admits she knows she’s facing the end of her career.

Katerina Siniakova has become the player with the third-most weeks at No. 1 on the WTA doubles rankings, while Janice Tjen became the first Indonesian woman in over two decades to break the Top 100.

While the ITF World Junior Masters lineup was revealed, former World No. 1 Laura Samson spoke about the impact the ITF Junior Accelerator Program had as she’s made new strides professionally.

For Shira Cohen and many others who survived the Supernova Music Festival attack two years ago in Israel, tennis has been an outlet and escape.

Following her return from elbow surgery, Zheng Qinwen withdrew from tournaments in both Wuhan and Ningbo, effectively ending her season.

Naomi Osaka finally revealed the Labubu that would’ve made an appearance if she had won her U.S. Open semifinal:

Technifibre has released a special edition pickleball paddle, collaborating with Danielle Collins on the project.

Tweet of the Week

Five at The IX: China Open

Q. You said before you learned that you’re stronger than maybe you give yourself credit for. Your ability to bounce back from a career perspective is pretty well-documented. What do you tell yourself and why do you think you still have those doubts, if you have them at all, that you’re facing something that you can’t break through or rebound from, because obviously you’ve shown the ability to do it now? What are the sources of those doubts?

AMANDA ANISIMOVA: I think they’re just normal human experiences. I think your mind can play tricks on you and tell you you can’t keep going, if there’s certain pains you’re having, I don’t know, even negativity that shows up. I think that’s just part of my learning process, just getting better with each day.

I think the mental game is so important for an athlete. I’m still constantly learning and trying to get better in that department. I think there’s always room for improvement there.

Yeah, that’s why I said that this week has been really great for me in terms of pushing myself and learning ways to keep myself in check and to keep, I don’t know, pushing myself and being mentally strong.

We as athletes don’t feel great day in, day out. I think that’s just part of the learning process.

Q. Jasmine, it’s been a pretty spectacular two weeks for you in China Open with all the fan reception, the nicknames, the vest. What has made the China Open this year particularly special for you?

JASMINE PAOLINI: I played this tournament from 2023. It’s always been a great feeling to come to the China Open. I think it’s really great tournament, well-organized, nice people, nice fans. I really like to play here. This year I managed to play better in singles. Was a tough one.

It’s always great to be back here. It’s a really great tournament to me.

Q. Sara, on your experience at China Open, obviously you’re well-familiar with this event. What do you make of how much it’s grown and changed, in your opinion? How would you sum up this year for yourself?

SARA ERRANI: Yeah, they improve a lot everything, the court, the stability. It’s always nice for us, easy to stay here, beautiful everything. We feel a lot of love from the people also. That is important thing.

Was long because is a long tournament, but we enjoyed a lot. We stay fine, good. Was great two weeks

Q. Because of your run in Beijing, your ranking shot up. You’re in the top 20 for the first time. Is this ranking going to change anything in the way that you think, prepare, choose tournaments to play at?

LINDA NOSKOVA: Well, going into the top 20 this year have definitely been a big goal for me. At the same time I just didn’t want to put really any pressure on myself.

A couple months ago I told myself it would be nice to be in top 20, but it would be nice as well to be in top 30 or 40. I mean, just playing these top tournaments and these best players in the world is just quite a dream come true. I still have to remind myself of that.

I’m not really focusing on what number in the world am I. I don’t feel like that’s that much important. I’m just enjoying my time on court. Whatever happens happens. I feel like this might be my motto now (smiling).

Yeah, I’m just enjoying it.

Q. About the letter that the top 10 are sending to the Grand Slams, you said you weren’t part of that last conversation.

COCO GAUFF: Yeah.

Q. More generally, why did you personally add your name to the first letter as well as the second letter?

COCO GAUFF: No, I think for me personally, I think for the long run of our sport, the whole ecosystem, I think it’s really important. As we know in this sport, the Grand Slams are generating the most revenue, at least the stats and the percentages they gave me, when you look at the percentage of that revenue going to prize money, it is not the same as the WTA and ATP, even though they’re generating less revenue than the slams.

I think it’s important for the whole ecosystem of the sport. Sometimes people are focused on just the prize money. We’re not talking about just raising the prize money for the champion, but trickling all the way down to quallies.

We kind of want them to invest more in the tour as a whole, not only when it comes to prize money, but the well-being of players and just trickling that down, all the way down to the lower-ranked players as well. Our 200th best player, 300th best player are struggling to make ends meet. In other leagues, it’s not that common, especially with the revenue that tennis is generating.

I think for me it was important for the long run of the sport, I don’t know if it will happen in my career lifetime in this sport, where it reaches that. I want to leave the sport better than I found it. Obviously, all the top-10 players agree. I think this is the first time on the tour we’ve gotten both the top 10 on men and women to sign something and agree to something. I think it’s a big step.

Yeah, I know they’re having conversations. Hopefully we can reach a solution in the near future.