Maria Sara Popa

Maria Sara Popa (born 29 July 2005) is a Romanian tennis player. She reached No. 1 in the Tennis Europe U14 rankings, achieved in April 2022.

Popa, who began playing at the age of four, has a career-high singles ranking by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) of 395. She is one of only six women who played three ITF singles finals in 2023, at such a young age, winning one of them and is among the world's youngest 20 players in WTA's Top 600. Of all the players from her country, Popa holds the record of being the youngest Romanian with an ITF Women's singles final in the last six years and the only one to have reached No. 1 in the Tennis Europe U14 rankings since 2013. She is coached by her father, Ioan Raul Popa. She won three matches, before losing to Sara Errani in the round of 16.

ITF Circuit finals

Singles: 6 (4 titles, 2 runner-ups) LegendW25/35 tournaments (1–0)W15 tournaments (3–2)Finals by surfaceClay (4–2)

Doubles: 1 (title) LegendW15 tournaments (1–0)Finals by surfaceClay (1–0) ResultW–LDateTournamentTierSurfacePartnerOpponentsScoreWin 1–0 Dec 2025ITF Antalya, TurkiyeW15 Clay Diae El Jardi Meshkatolzahra Safi Xu Jiayu 6–4, 3–6, [13–11]

ITF Junior Circuit finals

Singles: 2 (1 title, 1 runner-up)

Doubles: 2 (1 title, 1 runner-up)

Tennis Europe finals and summary Popa won five out of the nine singles finals she played on this circuit and two out of the eight she played in doubles. The last title she won in May 2019 was also the title which helped her achieve the No. 1 position in the U14 age category.

Overall singles record: 124-46 (72.9%)

Overall doubles record: 47-27 (63.5%)

UTR Pro Tennis Tour finals and summary The Universal Tennis Rating (UTR) Pro Tennis Tour is an alternative to the WTA and ITF tours. Popa reached the final in both tournaments that she played. She lost the first one to Ioana Gaspar in May 2022 and the second one to Alisa Baranovska in June 2023.

Overall record: 8-4 (66.7%), including group stage matches.