Naomi Osaka nearly dethrones Iga Swiatek and all of 2024’s best WTA matches

The 2024 tennis season was filled with noteworthy stories, breakthrough moments, and countless trophy lifts. But what were the best matches of the year that was?

We rolled the tape, and this week, TENNIS.com counted down some of the best WTA matches of the past year (with our ATP picks to come next week). Our countdown concludes with our overall Top 5 matches of the year. These matches, each for their own reasons, thrilled and entertained, and played an integral part in the year’s overall narrative.

5. Barbora Krejcikova def. Elena Rybakina, Wimbledon SF

When Barbora Krejcikova and Elena Rybakina met in the Wimbledon semifinals, they had a hard act to follow. Jasmine Paolini had just defeated Donna Vekic in the longest women’s singles semifinal in Wimbledon history, and the two major champions had

It started as anything but. The 2022 Wimbledon winner raced out to a 4-0 lead in the first set, leaving Krejcikova reeling. But the 2021 Roland Garros champion started willing her way into the match from there, winning three of the next four games—including two breaks of the Rybakina serve—to close in to 5-3 before the Kazakh closed out the opening frame.

But there were more twists to come in this tale.

“I felt that if I’m going to just stay in the game and if I will keep fighting and try to just stay there with her, that I’m going to get my chances,” Krejcikova later said.

After five straight holds to start the second set, she broke for 4-2 en route to evening the match at a set apiece, then broke again for 4-3 in the third en route to pulling off the come-from-behind victory over the No. 4 seed.

The former world No. 2 was never broken after the first set, and she didn’t even face a single break point in the third set.

4. Aryna Sabalenka def. Zheng Qinwen, Wuhan F

The WTA’s autumn return to the Dongfeng Voyah Wuhan Open was not only notable for it being the first edition of the tournament since 2019. It was also a homecoming for Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen, marking her first time competing in her home country (and province) since she topped the Olympic podium in a first for China.

Playing the tournament for the first time, the golden girl stormed to the final by defeating Jaqueline Cristian, Leylah Fernandez, Jasmine Paolini and Wang Xinyu to advance to a match with the two-time defending champion Aryna Sabalenka, who said the city felt like home for her, too. With Zheng having been winless against Sabalenka in three previous meetings, all in straight sets, Chinese tennis fans dubbed her “the mountain that Zheng has yet to overcome.”

“I will continue working to make sure she cannot overcome this mountain,” the top seed joked pre-tournament.

And though Zheng still couldn’t overcome Sabalenka when they played for the Wuhan trophy, it was the closest she’s come so far.

For the first set and a half, it seemed like she still had a long way to go as she attempted to scale the proverbial mountain, as Sabalenka quickly forged ahead by a set and a break, but Zheng’s level lifted, a sell-out crowd of 13,000 fans spurred her on, and she won her first set against the three-time major champion.

From a double-break 0-3 deficit in the deciding set, Zheng clawed one of the breaks back and held a point to level the score 3-3—but Sabalenka held firm, and denied the home favorite the epic comeback as she closed out the victory in two hours and 41 minutes.

3. Iga Swiatek def. Naomi Osaka, Roland Garros R2

When the draw for the year’s second Grand Slam was made in full, a towering fgiure loomed large three lines away from top seed and two-time defending champion Iga Swiatek in the form of Naomi Osaka, who was set to make a return to the tournament where she once courted controversy off the court by saying she wouldn’t do post-match press conferences.

But Osaka’s return from maternity leave in 2024 included a redemptive arc during the spring clay-court season. She won a round in Madrid and reached the last 16 in Rome, where she upset Marta Kostyuk and Daria Kasatkina. She said at the Foro Italico that she still felt like a “baby giraffe” on the surface but was committed to growing as a clay-court player.

“There’s definitely beauty to it, and I’m taking a lot of inspiration from people who do well on it,” she also said in Madrid. “I’m not expecting to be like Iga, but I just want to do the best with what I have.”

But the second-round match that Osaka and Swiatek played on Court Philippe-Chatrier showed loud and clear that Osaka’s best is still on par with the best in the world, even on the surface she likes least.

“It’s hard to have any logical thoughts,” Swiatek said post-match after a match-point saving effort in which she came back from 5-2 down in the third set—and saved the match point down 5-3—to edge her fellow four-time Grand Slam champion, 7-6(1), 1-6, 7-5.

“I honestly didn’t believe I could win, because I would be pretty naive” to think that, she said. She added that Osaka’s own comments about her clay-court level led to her being surprised about what the four-time major winner nonetheless brought to the table.

“Even she says that she’s not playing the best tennis on clay,” Swiatek said. “So I’m not expecting anything before [this match], but her shots were really clean and really heavy today.”

Was the escape against Osaka a wake-up call that Swiatek, weary after winning Madrid and Rome, needed spur herself on a third straight title in Paris? We may never know, but she didn’t lose a set for the rest of the tournament, and only dropped 17 games in the next five rounds.

2. Iga Swiatek def. Aryna Sabalenka, Madrid F

The 2023 final between Swiatek and Sabalenka in Madrid was a three-set thriller eventually won by Sabalenka, by an entertaining 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 final score. How would the two fierce rivals top that in 2024, many wondered, as they advanced to another championship match at the Caja Magica?

Just by playing the longest WTA final of the season, , and by saving three championship points.

“This was one of the craziest finals I’ve played in my life,” Swiatek told Tennis Channel’s Prakash Amritraj after finally winning the last “big” clay-court title to elude her in her young career. “I’ve never won such a tight and intense match at the end of a tournament, so it’s making me super proud that I could just stick to what I wanted to do until the end and I didn’t lose my focus.”

Two of Sabalenka’s chances to win the match came as Swiatek served to force a third-set tiebreak, the first such decider in any match of their rivalry. Sabalenka, who had led 3-1 earlier in the set, missed a forehand just wide on her first opportunity, while Swiatek wiped away the second with a solid follow-up to a strong serve.

Sabalenka earned a third match point at 7-6 but this time, a backhand went long, and another error handed Swiatek her second championship point. When Sabalenka’s final backhand missed, Swiatek dropped to the ground in an exhausted celebration.

“Who’s gonna say now that women’s tennis is boring?” Swiatek asked the Spanish audience at the Caja Magica during the trophy ceremony.

1. Jasmine Paolini def. Donna Vekic, Wimbledon SF

We’ll leave it to Steve Tignor to speak on this one.

What should the criteria be for a Match of the Year? Should it be the one that made our jaws drop the farthest with the quality of its play? Or should it be the one that stirred our emotions to the highest point with its spellbinding theater?

If you favor peak quality, then Iga Swiatek’s win over Aryna Sabalenka in the Madrid final would surely be your pick. For three hours and three roller-coaster sets, the WTA’s two best players traded haymakers, and the momentum, back and forth until Swiatek saved match points and survived.

Most seasons, that would be more than enough for me to make it the Match of the Year. But in 2024, there was one drama that surpassed it: Jasmine Paolini’s comeback win over Donna Vekic in the Wimbledon semifinals.