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The 26-year-old Queenslander, who announced her sudden retirement last April, received a rousing ovation from the crowd as she strolled on to the court with the trophy she captured in inspired fashion 12 months ago. Last year, Barty claimed her third and final major title by defeating Danielle Collins 6-3, 7-6 in the final to become Australia's first homegrown champion in 44 years.

The match was featured as one between two fearless offensive players, a narrative that played out throughout the duration of the final. In the end, the players struck 82 winners between them, 51 from the racquet of Sabalenka, but the undaunting play of the No.5 seed during tense moments ultimately made the difference.

Sania and Bopanna were beaten 7-6(2), 6-2 by Brazilians Stefani and Matos, who were playing in their first-ever Grand Slam final. In her final major, the 36-year-old Sania admitted her emotions almost boiled over after the Indians stunned third seeds and reigning Wimbledon champions Desirae Krawczyk and Neal Skupski in the semifinals.

Sabalenka, who claimed her 11th career title at the Adelaide International 1 three weeks ago, has now won 10 matches in a row, including a career-best 20 consecutive sets. The longest match winning streak of her career to date is 15, encompassing three titles at Ostrava 2020, Linz 2020 and Abu Dhabi 2021.

Playing in her first Australian Open semifinal, Rybakina had a tough task of facing a major champion for the third straight match.The 23-year-old paved her way to the biggest hard-court final of her career by notching wins over last year's finalist, Danielle Collins, World No.1 Iga Swiatek, 2019 French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko, and two-time Australian Open champion Azarenka.

The 21-year-old Hijikata and 29-year-old Kubler recorded a remarkable 6-4, 6-2 semifinal victory against eighth seeds Spanish-Argentine combination Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos here at Rod Laver Arena. "This is the first time I've played during the day on Rod Laver Arena, so I was, to be honest, a little bit nervous coming out. But then as soon as our energy starts going.

Djokovic was taking on the highest-ranked opponent of his Melbourne campaign so far in World No. 6 Rublev, but he took command early and barely looked back in the pair's maiden Grand Slam meeting. The fourth seed nullified Rublev's powerful groundstrokes with typically resilient defence and hit cleanly through the ball from the baseline throughout, accelerating to a comfortable two-hour, three-minute victory on Rod Laver Arena.

Sabalenka, who had never gone beyond the fourth round of the Grand Slam before this year, is yet to drop a set in Melbourne as she extended her unbeaten run to nine matches to start the season. She flipped the script of her career head-to-head against Vekic with the 1 hour, 49-minute victory, beating the Croatian for just the second time in seven career meetings.

Azarenka will contest her first semifinal in Melbourne since her 2013 title run, her first Grand Slam semifinal since the 2020 U.S. Open and ninth overall. Standing in her path in the last four is Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan, who beat Jelena Ostapenko in straight sets earlier in the day.

The Rio Olympic semifinalists on Monday defeated Japan's Makoto Ninomiya and Uruguay's Ariel Behar 6-4, 7-6(11-9) in their second-round match to set up a quarterfinal clash with Ostapenko and Hernandez. The Indian duo had earlier beaten Australia's Jaimee Fourlis and Luke Saville in the first round.