Elena Rybakina has brought Aryna Sabalenka’s extended stay at the top of the WTA Rankings to an end, moving into the world No 1 position and becoming the 30th player to reach the summit.

Sabalenka had controlled the top spot for a significant stretch, starting her second spell on 21 October 2024 and remaining there for 99 consecutive weeks before Rybakina pushed her down to No 2 after the US Open.

The breakthrough makes Rybakina the first player from Kazakhstan to climb to No 1 in the world. Her rise was confirmed after reaching the semi-finals at Flushing Meadows, and she then added the season-ending Grand Slam in New York, building a strong cushion over the Belarusian.

Rybakina’s ascent also changes the shape of the list of former No 1s still active on tour. There are now seven WTA players who have held the top ranking and remain competing.

*Although Victoria Azarenka has not officially retired, she is currently listed as inactive by the official WTA website with her last official match at the 2025 US Open.

At the top of that active group is Rybakina herself, whose time at No 1 has only just begun and is set to continue for at least a couple of months thanks to a lead of more than 2,000 points over Sabalenka.

Karolina Pliskova is next with eight weeks at No 1. She remains the only active player to have reached world No 1 without winning a Grand Slam, despite runner-up finishes at the US Open in 2016 and Wimbledon in 2021.

Venus Williams holds 11 weeks at the summit, spread across three short spells in 2002. Naomi Osaka follows with 25 weeks, while Sabalenka’s total stands at 107 weeks, placing her 10th on the all-time list.

Iga Swiatek has collected 125 weeks, good for seventh all-time, while Serena Williams leads the way with 319 weeks. Her record includes eight separate stints at No 1, and her place at the top remains unmatched in the current group.

Alexander Zverev closed out the US Open in unusual fashion, finishing the final without immediately realising he had secured his first title in New York. Only after members of his team told him did he understand that the match was over and the trophy was his.

The German denied America a first male champion at Flushing Meadows since 2003 with a composed 6-3, 7-6(2), 5-7, 6-2 win that quieted a partisan Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd. It was a significant breakthrough after years of expectation, especially given how much the 2020 US Open final had hurt him.

Even so, his reaction at the end was not the one anyone expected. After winning, he did not immediately register the result and sent the balls back across the net to Shelton as though another service game was still to come. It took his coach and brother in his box to point out what had happened. Once Zverev looked at the scoreboard, he realised he was Grand Slam champion again.

The reaction was so unexpected that Jonathan Overend called it “a meme for all-time”. Martina Navratilova was equally taken aback, saying, “I have seen a lot… I’ve seen people lose score, but I’ve never seen this in a Grand Slam singles final,” before adding, “It was crazy.”

Navratilova still praised the way Zverev finished, noting that he recovered after a nervous spell, lost only one set and remained in control when it mattered most. She also said Ben could not find openings against him, and that whatever nerves Zverev had, they amounted to little over four sets.

In his speech to the crowd, Zverev pointed to the wider significance of the moment. “We went 30 years without winning a Grand Slam title, and now we’ve won two in three months,” said Zverev. “2026 is the outcome of all the years that happened before.”

The victory brought him $5.5 million in prize money for his second Grand Slam title.

Alexander Zverev has continued to reduce the distance to Jannik Sinner in the ATP Rankings, while Carlos Alcaraz has slipped further back after failing to defend his US Open title and Novak Djokovic has suffered a major setback.

Sinner set the pace through the early part of 2026, leaving Zverev more than 9,000 points behind at one stage. But the German has steadily improved his position thanks to his French Open triumph and runner-up finish at Wimbledon, and his run to the US Open final has tightened the race again.

Before the final at Flushing Meadows, the gap to Sinner, who missed the event because of injury, had been cut to 2,510. If Zverev goes on to win the title, he could leave New York only 1,810 points behind the Italian.

Alcaraz began the tournament 630 points behind Zverev, having already missed four months with injury. His quarter-final defeat in New York deepened the problem, after he dropped 2,000 points from the start of the event and collected only 400 for reaching the last eight. That leaves him more than 3,000 points behind Zverev, while Ben Shelton has closed to within 880 points.

Shelton’s semi-final run has pushed him five places to No 4 in the Live Rankings, and a title would leave him just 180 points behind Alcaraz. Frances Tiafoe is another mover, rising four places to a career-best No 8.

Djokovic’s early exit has been costly. The 24-time Grand Slam winner is out of the top 10 for the first time since July 2018 after his shock first-round loss to Mariano Navone. Having defended 800 points from last year’s semi-final, he dropped 790 and slid to No 12.

Karen Khachanov, Alexander Blockx, Alex Michelsen, Botic van de Zandschulp, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Arthur Gea, Michael Zheng, Toby Samuel, Yibing Wu and Dane Sweeny were among the other players to make notable gains, while Raphael Collignon, Nuno Borges, Thiago Agustin Tirante, Juan Manuel Cerundolo, Jan-Lennard Struff, Daniel Altmaier, Jaume Munar, Tomas Machac, Alex Molcan, Holger Rune and Jack Draper all moved down.