When the Mutua Madrid Open rolls around each year, it means the Clay-Court swing has kicked into full gear and the second major of the year is just around the corner.
Along with the Internazionali BNL d'Italia in Rome, these back-to-back WTA 1000s make up one of the most intriguing and jam-packed months on the WTA Tour Driven by Mercedes-Benz calendar.
The cities are beautiful and rich in culture, the stadiums are packed and the competition is heightened leading up to the French Open. And with such elite fields, combined with marathon points and the variety of shots that come with clay-court tennis, these two stops reliably deliver sensational matches.
That's certainly been the case the last three years.
Ahead of the 2026 Mutua Madrid Open, we've picked our favorite matches from these tournaments from 2023 through 2025, and the storylines and throughlines that made them so memorable.
2025
Madrid: Coco Gauff d. Iga Swiatek 6-1, 6-1, semifinals
This match wasn't phenomenal, and it wasn't dramatic -- at least not after the first few games. But we had to pick this one for the surprise factor.
Keep in mind that coming into this match, Swiatek had won 10 straight matches in Madrid, and 15 of her last 16.
Swiatek was the defending champion and the clear favorite, and it would have been surprising had she simply been beat. Instead, she was dominated.
Using her all-world movement to her advantage on the slow clay, Gauff dropped just two games in 64 minutes. She lost the opening game, then won 11 straight and 12 of the last 13. She never faced a break point and lost just two points on her first serve.
It foreshadowed what would end up being a career-changing Clay-Court swing for Gauff, culminating in her second career Grand Slam.
Rome: Jasmine Paolini d. Coco Gauff 6-4, 6-2, final
Gauff followed up her run to the Madrid final with a run to the Rome final. On the other side of the net was Jasmine Paolini, and the end result instantly became one of the most memorable moments in the nearly 100-year history of the tournament.
With President Sergio Mattarella watching from the stands in Campo Centrale, Paolini beat Gauff to become the first Italian women's champion at the tournament in 40 years, and the first to win the title in Rome in the Open Era. (The last Italian champion, Raffaella Reggi, won the title in Taranto.)
After Gauff couldn't handle Paolini's serve on the second championship point, the adoring crowd roared. Paolini stretched her arms out, flashed her signature smile and basked in the moment of her career in the middle of the court.
2024
Madrid: Iga Swiatek d. Aryna Sabalenka 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (7), final
These two giants of the game have played many classics against each other, but none was more thrilling than their 2024 final in Madrid.
In arguably the match of 2024, and a rematch of the previous year's final -- more on that below -- Swiatek saved three championships points and went on to win 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (7) in 3 hours and 11 minutes. She saved the first two championship points at 5-6 down in the third set, then saved another in the tiebreaker.
They each broke each other five times, and when Sabalenka's final ball sailed long, Swiatek collapsed on the red clay like she'd won her first Slam. It was her first (and still only) title in Madrid.
"This was one of the craziest finals I’ve played in my life," she said on the Tennis Channel. "I’ve never won such a tight and intense match at the end of a tournament."
Rome: Aryna Sabalenka d. Elina Svitolina 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 (9), fourth round
The latter rounds of this tournament were pretty straightforward, so we're digging a bit deeper and resurfacing this fourth-round gem, which you may or may not have forgotten about. But it's certainly worth remembering.
After starting sloppily, Sabalenka managed to level the match despite a lower back problem. Then in the third, she was clutch in the deciding tiebreaker, years before her ability to win those consistently became a hallmark of her greatness.
In addition to her power, Sabalenka executed her drop shot well throughout the match, a precursor to what is a critical piece of her game in 2026.
Sabalenka saved three match points in the match, which ended at 12:45 a.m. local time.
2023
Madrid: Aryna Sabalenka d. Iga Swiatek 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, final
Their first Madrid final wasn't quite as tense as the one the following year -- that one can hardly be topped -- but it was still one of the most competitive, hard-fought matches they've played.
Swiatek came in as the World No. 1 and the clear favorite, especially considering Sabalenka had never taken a set off her in three prior clay-court meetings. One of those matches had come less than two weeks earlier, when Swiatek eased past Sabalenka 6-3, 6-4 in the Stuttgart final.
This match told a different story.
In the first WTA 1000 final between a No. 1 and No. 2 since 2014, Sabalenka dictated points and overpowered Swiatek, nearly doubling her winner count (32 to 17). Swiatek hung tough in the third, coming from 3-0 down to cut it to 4-3, but Sabalenka converted her fourth championship point to lock down her second Madrid title in three years.
Rome: Anhelina Kalinina d. Beatriz Haddad Maia 6-7 (2), 7-6 (6), 6-3, quarterfinals
In the longest match of the season up until that point -- only to be outdone by another Haddad Maia match in Paris, which went 10 minutes longer -- Kalinina, then ranked No. 47, overcame 12th-seeded Haddad Maia in a 3 hour and 41 minute epic.
"It feels great, but I can't feel my body or my legs," Kalinina said after advancing to the biggest semifinal of her career.
After the first two sets ended in tiebreakers, Haddad Maia jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the decider, at which point the match was over three hours old. But on the brink, Kalinina found a second gear -- or third, or fourth, or tenth? -- and somehow took the last six games for the grueling and exhausting win.
That was Kalinina's second straight three-set win, after upsetting Madison Keys in the match before, and she won another three-setter in the semifinals, upsetting Veronika Kudermetova 7-5, 5-7, 6-2. Sadly, she retired early in the second set of the final with a left thigh injury.