WTA500 Strasbourg: Liudmila Samsonova vs Elena Rybakina final analysis
Heading into the French Open, Rybakina showed signs of a return to form (and a serve in top form)
Elena Rybakina (WTA #12) defeated Liudmila Samsonova (WTA #21) 6-1, 6-7 [2:7], 6-1 in the Strasbourg final to win the last tune-up event before Roland Garros and end a 13-month title drought.
Rybakina had last appeared in a championship match when she won the prestigious Porsche Tennis Grand Prix in April 2024. A triumph that was followed by a string of injuries, illnesses and off-court controversy related to the currently suspended coach Stefano Vukov, leading to a drop in results, a lack of trophies and an exit from the Top-10 for the first time since February 2023.
Even though this week’s victory wasn't enough to lift the 25-year old Kazakh back into the Top-10, it showed a promising level raise and provided a timely confidence boost ahead of the French Open that most certainly left her rivals on notice.
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Match analysis
Rybakina served up something special in the Strasbourg final. The eventual champion slammed down 16 aces and saw half of her 1st serves go unreturned.
Unreturned 1st serves
Samsonova: 18%, 8 of 44
Rybakina: 49%, 31 of 63
It was ominous for Samsonova’s title hopes that Rybakina started the match with a pair of aces.
The Kazakh also fired a bomb to clinch the opening set and, fittingly, sealed the title with consecutive deliveries that Samsonova couldn’t get a racquet on.
📺 source: WTA Tv
By the end of the Strasbourg final, Rybakina’s brilliant serving performance had created a jaw-dropping 38-12 advantage in 1-shot points (marked by red box, below).
With such devastating numbers, Rybakina only had to stay relatively close during rallies. She did a little more than that in sets 1 and 3, accruing 3- and 1-point advantages that contributed to lopsided 6-1 scores.
Rallies won by set
Set 1: Samsonova 17 / Rybakina 20
Set 2: Samsonova 34 / Rybakina 24
Set 3: Samsonova 12 / Rybakina 13
To win a close second set, Samsonova had to:
land 60% (15/25) of 1st serve returns and 88% (16/18) of 2nd serve returns
win 10 more rallies (34-24)
perform 6 points better from the forehand wing and 3 points better from the backhand wing (blue and green circles, respectively).
Samsonova’s forehand was outstanding in the second set tie-break, creating a 4:1 separation that turned out to be decisive.
But the Russian was unable to sustain that level for the whole match.
At the end of it, data showed Samsonova was most productive on forehands struck from the middle half of the Deuce side, accumulating 8 winners and 4 forcing groundstrokes (black circle on the left, below).
Against Rybakina’s lights-out serving, Samsonova needed something similar out of regular forehands hit from closer to the Deuce sideline or of three-quarters run-around forehands.
Instead, she couldn’t avoid finishing with more errors than winning groundstrokes on both (grey and blue circles on the right, respectively), a lack of efficiency that meant her title chances were gone.
Liudmila Samsonova (WTA #21, seed 8) vs Elena Rybakina (WTA #12, seed 4)
2025 Strasbourg final - Match Data
Set by Set Stats
Strategy Stats
Strokes Breakdown
Direction of winning shots and unforced errors (only groundstrokes)
Serve and Return
2nd Serves
Return & rallying performance
Rally length
Points won breakdown
This final section gives a last, broader look at the match by presenting how each player won points. Points are listed according to their frequency (highest to lowest) and are named in relation to the last touch on the ball. For simplicity, groundstrokes hit from the 5th shot onwards are grouped together.
Breakdown by side (FHs or BHs)
Breakdown by error type (UFEs or FEs)
To find out more about the stats published here, please visit the following post.
While we follow the same criteria used on all major tennis events, our stats are collected through our own video analysis and are not official WTA or ITF stats.
Thanks for reading!
— Tennis Inside Numbers