Leylah Fernandez is the WTA World #25, a left-handed Canadian from Montreal whose run to the 2021 US Open final at 19 years old remains one of the most thrilling Grand Slam sequences in recent memory. Born to an Ecuadorian father and a Filipino-Canadian mother, Fernandez grew up in the tennis culture of Montreal and developed a game that is all angles, all disruption, built to neutralise power with precision and pull the biggest hitters in the world into a style of tennis they cannot simply overpower their way through.
At Flushing Meadows in 2021, Fernandez defeated Naomi Osaka, Angelique Kerber, Elina Svitolina, and Aryna Sabalenka in succession on the way to the final. These were not upsets manufactured by luck or a hot night of serving. They were the product of a systematic, confident approach to disrupting the rhythms of players who were, on paper, far more established. The whole tennis world watched her in those two weeks and understood: this was not a flash. This was a player.
Her left-handedness is central to everything she does. The natural angles she produces from her forehand side, the serve that kicks away from right-handed returners in the deuce court, the backhand slice that sits low and drags opponents forward: all of it is amplified by the structural advantage of being left-handed in a tour dominated by right-handed players. Fernandez does not rely on that advantage alone, but she uses it intelligently, constructing points that make opponents uncomfortable from the very first shot rather than settling into neutral exchanges.
The period between that US Open final and her current ranking has involved the normal difficulties of a young professional career: injury, the inevitable adjustment as opponents study your game more closely, and the physical demands of sustaining elite performance over long seasons. She has navigated these challenges and maintained a top-25 ranking, which is a meaningful accomplishment. The platform she built in 2021 has not been squandered. She continues to compete with the same belief and tactical clarity that made those two weeks in New York so compelling.
Fernandez will compete at the 2026 Grand Slams: the Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon, and the US Open. Check Canada time for match schedules in her home timezone.