Leylah Fernandez is a Canadian tennis player, born in 2002 in Montreal, in the province of Quebec.
📜 Leylah Fernandez History
Fernandez and her younger sister, Bianca, are both coached by their father, Jorge, a former footballer with no background in tennis.
As a junior player, Fernandez reached the 2019 Australian Open girls' singles final, and a few months later went one better, winning the Roland-Garros girls' singles title. The 2019 season also saw the Canadian turn professional, and she was soon picking up wins at Challenger events. At the 2020 Abierto Mexicano, Fernandez reached her first WTA-level singles final, and a couple of months later she reached the third round of Roland-Garros, but it was in 2021 that she truly announced herself to a global audience. Off the back of winning her first WTA singles title in March, in Monterrey, Fernandez reached the final of the US Open women's singles draw, aged only 19. Although she was ultimately defeated by fellow tennager Emma Raducanu, Fernandez's run to the final included wins against 3 of the tournament's top-5 seeds, and it saw her stock rise immensely. Fernandez ended the 2021 season ranked inside the top-25, having been outside the top-200 only 2 years before.
Fernandez is particularly comfortable on clay and hard surfaces, and likes to play aggressively from the baseline. In beating such established and highly-ranked players as a teenager she has demonstrated the fearlessness in her game, as well as the consistency of her shot-making. Fernandez's forehand and backhand are both good. Combined with her agility around the court, these weapons allow her to play deep, accurate shots from a range of angles, which compensate for her relative lack of power.
