"I believe in myself" - Rybakina on reaching Wimbledon final

No.17 seed Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan eased past 2019 champion and No.16 seed Simona Halep of Romania 6-3, 6-3 for the Wimbledon final.

Rybakina will now face another first-time Grand Slam finalist, No.3 seed Ons Jabeur of Tunisia, for the Wimbledon title Saturday. Jabeur leads their head-to-head 2-1, with Rybakina winning their first encounter in 2019 but Jabeur taking both meetings last year. She said:

"It was very tough because I was going just up. I thought that I can play every tournament no matter how I feel. It was just going always my way. I felt really good. Everything was new for me. After [the pandemic], after this long period, it was very difficult to come back. During pandemic, I didn't practise at all. It wasn't easy. Then some health problems like injuries, sick, allergies. It kept on happening. I was very upset, of course.”

She added:

"My coach was always telling me that, ‘You don't have to wait [for] when you're going to be in the perfect shape. You’re going to win no matter how you feel. You just need to keep working and keep improving. Now I understand that you don't have to be perfect every day to win matches and go far in tournaments.”

Rybakina finished off with:

“I believe in myself. We worked a lot with my team to get through. Of course, no one expected that it's going to be this week at Wimbledon. But this is something we worked a lot. Everybody believed in me in my team. I don't know how I'm going to react. We see … after tomorrow.”