American Amanda Anisimova took down Aryna Sabalenka — the top-ranked women’s player in the world — in three sets in the Wimbledon semifinals on Thursday.
Anisimova won the match 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, and will now play the winner of Iga Swiatek and Belinda Bencic in the final on Saturday.
Anisimova, the 13th seed, has never played in a Grand Slam final. Her best finish at a slam before this year was the French Open semis in 2019.
“This doesn’t feel real right now, honestly,” Anisimova said during an on-court interview after the match. “Aryna is such a tough competitor and I was absolutely dying out there. I don’t know how I pulled it out.”
Last year, Anisimova did not make it beyond the qualifying rounds at Wimbledon. Her best finish at the All-England Club came in 2022, when she made it to the quarterfinals.
After finishing 2024 as the 36th-ranked player in women’s tennis, Anisimova has put together her best season as a professional, winning her first WTA 1000 title earlier this year. She entered July ranked 12th, the highest of her career.
Sabalenka, 27, of Belarus, fell just short of Wimbledon’s final round for the third time in the last five years. Sabalenka also lost in the Wimbledon semis in 2021 and 2023.
After winning the Australian Open and U.S. Open last year, Sabalenka lost in the first two Grand Slam finals of 2025 before bowing out in the semis Thursday.
If Anisimova wins Saturday, she will become the third American woman to win a Grand Slam this year, after Madison Keys won the Australian Open and Coco Gauff won the French.
Anisimova, at 23, is the youngest American woman to make the Wimbledon final since Serena Williams in 2004. (Williams, then 22, lost to Maria Sharapova.)
