Wimbledon 2023: Markéta Vondroušová becomes the first unseeded woman to win a singles title at the All England Club
Markéta Vondroušová made history as the first unseeded player to win the women’s singles tournament at Wimbledon in a 6-4, 6-4 upset over No. 6 seed Ons Jabeur, who is the second seed for the second year in a row. The 24-year-old lefty joins two other Czech-born left-handers – Martina Navratilova and Petra Kvitová – to take home the Wimbledon title.
Jabeur opened the match strongly, jumping out to a 2-0 lead in the first set, and was able to fight through shaky service games to take a 4-2 lead, but the tide turned when Vondroušová kept love to bring to. 3-4, and then ripped off five games in a row to take the first set and open the first game of the second.
Vondroušová rode a steady performance to her first Grand Slam singles title in her second career major final. She was efficient, winning 6 of 7 break points in the match and committing just 13 unforced errors. Her resolve on stage was perhaps as impressive as her journey to the final. As well as being her first Grand Slam win, it is just her second WTA win after winning a lower-level event in 2017.
The Wimbledon champion will jump from No. 42 in the WTA rankings to No. 10 in the world with the win. She has shown glimpses of this level of tennis in the past – reaching the French Open final in 2019, also as an unseeded player – but was bitten by the injury bug a few years ago, ‘ including a wrist injury she sustained in a and as a spectator at Wimbledon in 2022.
“The comebacks are not easy. … You don’t know what to expect and after the second one I was playing the minors and I was hoping to come back at this level, and now this is happening.” Vondroušová said after collecting the Venus Rosewater Dish, and referring to the second round of wrist surgery that cost her much of the 2022 season.
For Jabeur, it’s another bitter pill to swallow at the end of a remarkable run at Wimbledon. On her way to the finals, Jabeur defeated four Grand Slam champions, including avenging her loss in the 2022 Wimbledon finals to Elena Rybakina. She had come back from a set and a break three separate times this past fortnight, and is now 0-3 in major finals, having won three of her five Grand Slam finals last play to lose.
“I think this is the most painful loss of my career,” Jabeur said in tears on the court after the loss. “It was a difficult journey, but that’s tennis , and I promise to return one day to win this competition.
Next on the Grand Slam calendar is the US Open, where world No. 1 Iga Swiatek is the defending champion – Jabeur was runner-up in New York last year – which runs from August 28 to September 4 in the New York Hebrew.
