Toronto teen Mboko, Laval’s Fernandez through to second round at Citi Open

Victoria Mboko of Canada during their first round match of the Wimbledon tennis championships in London,Tuesday July 1,2025. (AP Photo/Dave Shopland)

WASHINGTON — Canadians Victoria Mboko and Leylah Fernandez won their opening matches Monday at the Citi Open hardcourt tennis tournament.

Mboko, a wild-card in Washington, came back from a break down in the second set to post a 6-2, 6-4 win over Russia’s Anastasia Potapova.

Fernandez followed with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Australia’s Maya Joint.

Mboko, an 18-year-old from Toronto, won 62.7 per cent of total service points compared to 50 per cent for Potapova.

The Canadian had 13 break-point chances against Potapova and converted five of them, the last coming in the deciding game. Potapova scored two breaks on six chances.

Mboko, who entered Washington with a career-high ranking of 86, will next face No. 12 Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan at the WTA 500 tournament.

Mboko, who has played both at the WTA Tour level and on the lower-tier ITF World Tennis Tour circuit this year, improved her record this season to 46-8.

She posted her fourth win of the season against a top-50 opponent as she prepares for her main-draw debut at the upcoming WTA 1000-level National Bank Open in Montreal.

Fernandez of Laval, Que., fired five aces and broke Joint three times on seven chances in a win that took just 80 minutes to complete.

The 22-year-old Canadian, ranked 36th in the world, saved the only break point she faced.

Fernandez will next face top-seed Jessica Pegula of the United States. Pegula has won both of the previous meetings between the players, with both matches coming on hardcourt.

In first-round doubles action, Eugenie Bouchard of Westmount, Que., and Clervie Ngounoue of the United were defeated 6-3, 6-1 by the American duo of Venus Williams and Hailey Baptiste.

The 31-year-old Bouchard, a former world No. 5 and a Wimbledon finalist in 2014, is playing in her second-last tournament after announcing last week that she will retire after the National Bank Open.

The 45-year-old Williams, a seven-time Grand Slam champion, is starting a comeback after more than a year away from tennis.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 21, 2025.