Osaka-Kvitova in showdown to crown world's best

WHEN Naomi Osaka and Petra Kvitova walk out on Melbourne's Rod Laver Arena on Saturday (4.30pm, Singapore time) to contest the Australian Open women's tennis final, it's a showdown that few could have predicted at the start of the two-week tournament.

It's the first time these two players will have faced each other on court. By the end of the match, one of them will not only be the winner of the first Grand Slam of the new tennis season, she will also surge straight to the top of the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) rankings when the list is updated on Monday, ending Romanian Simona Halep's 48-week reign.

The eighth seed Kvitova - a 28-year-old from the Czech Republic and a two-time Wimbledon champion - is on fire in Melbourne, breezing her way to the final without dropping a single set. It's worth noting, however, that she's only played one seeded player so far - Australia's 15th-seed Ashleigh Barty in the quarter-finals - so one could argue that the hard-hitting Kvitova has not been truly tested as yet.