Zheng powers into second straight final, faces Kenin for Tokyo title

World No.7 Zheng Qinwen's sizzling Asian swing continues at the Toray Pan Pacific Open. On Saturday, the 23-year-old advanced to her second consecutive Hologic WTA Tour final after defeating Diana Shnaider 7-6(5), 6-3 in the Tokyo semifinals. Bidding to capture her third title of the season, Zheng will face 2020 Australian Open champion Sofia Kenin for the title on Sunday.

Zheng has now won 27 of her last 31 matches since Wimbledon. Over that span, she won her first title of the season at the Palermo Ladies Open, captured Olympic gold, returned to the US Open quarterfinals and made her first WTA 1000 semifinal and final at the China Open and Dongfeng Voyah · Wuhan Open, respectively. 

Zheng goes into Sunday's final with an 11-2 record in the Asian swing this year. It will be her second straight trip to Tokyo's Championship Sunday, after making her first career WTA final in her tournament debut two years ago. 

Tokyo will be Zheng's final regular-season tournament before she heads to Saudi Arabia to make her tournament debut at the WTA Finals Riyadh presented by PIF. 

In the first career meeting between two of the game's brightest young talents, Zheng raced to a 4-0 lead before Shnaider came barreling back to force the first set to a tiebreak. Zheng led 5-3 but could not serve out the set. Shnaider's gritty baseline work helped her save four set points.

Shnaider and Zheng stayed neck and neck in the tiebreak until Zheng broke the deadlock at 5-5 to earn her fifth set point. The tour's ace leader then powered down an unreturnable serve to close out the 69-minute set. With a set in hand, Zheng closed out her 47th win of the year in 1 hour and 49 minutes.

While Tokyo has been a confirmation of Zheng's momentum and form, it has served as a place of resurgence for 155th-ranked Kenin. The American advanced to her first final of the year after beating Katie Boulter 6-4, 6-4. The win was Kenin's third over a Top 10 seed this week, having beaten No.10 seed Wang Xinyu and No.3 seed Daria Kasatkina. 

"Katie has been having a great year and she's a big player, powerful," Kenin said. "I tried to off-set it. I did a great job. Definitely this week means a lot to me, going where I've been coming from this past year."

With her run to the Tokyo final, Kenin is set to return to the Top 100 on the PIF WTA Rankings on Monday. She is bidding to win her first title in over four years (2020 Lyon).

"She's been having an amazing year," Kenin said. "I'm just going to rest up and see what happens. I've never played her so I don't really know much of her game style. I'll have to do some homework. As long as I don't get killed, I'm good. Just see how it goes tomorrow."