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Mertens/Sje, who were in second place, were superior with 6:1, 7:5.
At the beginning of the game, Ostapenko/Kichenoka played a break point in the first game and managed to take a 1-0 lead, but in the continuation the opponents played much more convincingly and won three times with the Latvian-Ukrainian duo’s serve, as of 6: 1.
At the beginning of the second set, Ostapenko/Kichenoka were able to prevail on the opponent’s serve and later hold their own serve game 2-0, but in the remaining time the second-seeded Mertens/Sje were once again superior – they managed to win 3-2 and to reach 5-3.
The Latvian-Ukrainian pair evened the score, but at the end of the match they lost two more games in a row, losing 1-6, 5-7.
Ostapenko and Kichenok reached the final of the “Grand Slam” tournament for the first time.
The Latvian tennis player had played in two “Grand Slam” doubles semi-finals in her career so far and reached this phase in France and Wimbledon with Kičenok in 2022. Her best success so far at the “Australian Open” was reaching the quarter-finals in 2020 together with the Canadian Gabriela Dabrovski.
Sje and Mertens won the 2021 Wimbledon Championships together. With other partners, the Taiwanese has won five more Grand Slam doubles titles, while the Belgian has two.
Ostapenko received 1,300 WTA doubles ranking points and half of the A$400,000 (€242,670) prize money for reaching the final.
Latvia’s strongest tennis player also took part in the Australian Open singles competition and was eliminated in the third round.
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