Aryna Sabalenka outduels Naomi Osaka to reach French Open quarterfinals

PARIS — Aryna Sabalenka emerged the victor from a heavyweight clash with fellow four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka Monday night at the French Open, her hopes for her first Grand Slam title away from hard courts still intact.

Sabalenka won, 7-5, 6-3, in a battle that showcased her variety and courage against one of the few players who can match her groundstrokes, pound for pound. Osaka’s career-best run at Roland Garros ended in the fourth round, as Sabalenka advanced to face Russia’s Diana Shnaider in the quarterfinals.

There was increased pressure even before the players walked out onto court Monday. Osaka and Sabalenka were playing the first women’s match scheduled in the night session at Roland Garros since 2023, and just the tournament’s fifth since it introduced a night session in 2021.

There are no two players in women’s tennis better equipped to handle the moment.

Sabalenka, the world No. 1, has never shied from a big stage nor wasted the chance to build her profile as a global star. Since leaving sports marketing behemoth IMG to sign in 2025 with the boutique agency Evolve — which Osaka founded with her agent, Stuart Duguid, in 2022, though Osaka left to return to IMG in December — she’s announced brand partnerships with the likes of Gucci and Emirates Airlines, filling her portfolio with top-class brands to match her tennis.

Osaka achieved global superstardom years ago. She employs a creative team and works with couturiers to design her singular on-court looks. Now nothing motivates her quite like a primetime atmosphere with a top player staring across the net from her. So it was Monday night in Paris, and fans who had been deprived of seeing the best players on the women’s tour duke it out were engaged from even before the first ball. They were seated for warm-ups and peppered the match with cheers for their favorite player.

They stood to record Osaka’s walk onto Court Philippe-Chatrier, for which she debuted yet another overskirt paired with the golden Nike dress she’s been wearing all tournament. This outfit was simple yet effective: a tulle-and-sequin skirt that extended her match dress all the way to the red clay. She glittered like a jewel in the evening light.

In a tournament where No. 7 Elina Svitolina and No. 8 Mirra Andreeva are the only other top-10 seeds remaining, and the men’s draw has been riddled by upsets, Sabalenka has held firm. The world No. 1 hasn’t dropped a set at the French Open.

She came in with a deep reservoir of confidence to drink from against Osaka. They’d played just once, in 2018, before meeting twice in two months this year. Sabalenka won both bouts — a 6-2, 6-4 rout that was over in 80 minutes at Indian Wells and a much stiffer, two-hour-and-20-minute battle on red clay in Madrid, which Sabalenka took 6-7(1), 6-3, 6-2.

Sabalenka said before the match that she was looking forward to the fight.

It started exactly as Sabalenka predicted, as a slugfest. She and Osaka traded walloping serves and forehands as if they were playing on a hard court, not red clay. Sabalenka racked up seven aces in the first set to Osaka’s one.

But part of the reason Sabalenka has had a chokehold on women’s tennis for the past few years is her boldness in big points — points during which other players might feel nerves or try to calculate which shots present the least risk while offering the biggest payoff.

There is no such equation in Sabalenka’s head during those points. At 5-5 in what had been an evenly contested first set, Sabalenka attacked a second serve from Osaka to set herself up for a backhand winner and break point. Osaka then sent a backhand into the net, and it was up to Sabalenka to serve for the set.

The best closer in women’s tennis sealed it with an ace.

It took Sabalenka less time to break in the second set as she mixed in more slice and drop shots to supplement a steady drumbeat of aces. The increased variety in Sabalenka’s game is the biggest factor that separates the two power players, and she clinched a break to go up 4-3 with a drop volley. From there, Sabalenka was in control, showcasing how she and the other top players of post-Osaka’s peak have moved tennis forward. Osaka can hang with them still, and there is time to evolve to beat them, too.

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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