MONTREAL, Canada (AFP) — World No. 10 Daria Kasatkina advanced to her 11th career WTA final by defeating France’s Diane Parry 6-2, 6-0 in a US Open tuneup Friday at Granby, Canada.
Kasatkina will play Saturday for the crown against Australia’s Daria Saville, who advanced to her first WTA final since 2017 by walkover Thursday when Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk withdrew from the event.
Kasatkina, 25, is from Russia but cannot represent her homeland under rules imposed by the tour following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
It’s the fifth career WTA final for Saville, but her first since Hong Kong in October 2017.
Saville won her only WTA title in August 2017 in another tuneup event the week before the US Open, taking the Connecticut Open crown.
Kasatkina chases her sixth WTA crown three weeks after claiming her most recent at San Jose.
Kasatkina, the US Open 10th seed, will face Britain’s 98th-ranked Harriet Dart in her first match on the New York hardcourts.
Meanwhile, seventh seed Aliaksandra Sasnovich and 45th-ranked Liudmila Samsonova advanced to the WTA Tennis in the Land final with victories on Friday in the US Open hardcourt tuneup.
Sasnovich outlasted French eighth seed Alize Cornet 6-7 (5/7), 7-5, 6-3 after two hours and 51 minutes while Samsonova dispatched American Bernarda Pera 6-1, 6-2 after 52 minutes in semifinal matches.
World No. 36 Sasnovich, a 28-year-old from Belarus, and Samsonova, a 23-year-old Russian, cannot represent their homelands due to tour rules imposed after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
