If Iga Swiatek is in relaxed mood on the eve of the WTA Finals, you can hardly blame her. The Polish world No 1 has been so far ahead of the chasing pack for most of this season that the greats of the past have offered a more relevant yardstick of her excellence than the challengers of the present.
For Swiatek, who goes into the season-ending showpiece as a runaway favourite, records have come thick and fast in the nine months since Ashleigh Barty’s retirement. The 37-match winning streak that established her dominance was the best since Martina Hingis in 1997, while her French and US Open wins made her the first player to win two majors in a year since Angelique Kerber in 2016. The love set with which she rounded off her recent title run in San Diego was her 21st of the season, the most since Serena Williams won 25 in 2013. Swiatek is also the first player to accumulate more than 10,000 ranking points in a year since Williams in 2015. By any measure, it has been a historic campaign.
No wonder Swiatek said she would prepare for her opening match in Fort Worth, Texas, by chilling out with a good movie. The 21-year-old may have lost two of her three group matches on her WTA Finals debut in Guadalajara last year, but times have moved on. Even the prospect of using the same regular duty Wilson balls that caused her such consternation during the US Open series seems to have left her unfazed.
“I just try to not think about and not overanalyse my opener and the obstacles that I’m going to face,” said Swiatek, looking ahead to her first match in Tracy Austin Group.
“I usually know what to do, and I have good routines to keep myself fresh and rest properly. I guess that’s the main thing I’m focusing about. We’re not practising too much the day before the match, so there’s a lot of free time, and it’s good to find a good movie that is going to keep you chilled.”
As she contemplates the field, Swiatek may see something of herself in some of her rivals; what she will not find is another player with the same blend of ability, intelligence and hunger that makes her the irresistible title favourite.
Take Daria Kasatkina, the 25-year-old Russian against whom Swiatek will open her challenge. Like the Pole, Kasatkina has compiled her best season to date, reaching a career-high ranking of eighth and making her first grand slam semi-final at Roland Garros. But in her last four meetings with Swiatek, which included a third-round defeat at Melbourne Park and a 6-2, 6-1 hammering in Paris, Kasatkina has garnered the princely sum of 14 games.
“I think the intensity Iga puts in her game is uncomfortable for most of the players,” said Kasatkina. “Facing this game, it’s different.”
The Russian will not be the only player bearing the baggage of past setbacks into her group-stage meeting with Swiatek. Coco Gauff, who arrives in Texas as the youngest qualifier for the WTA Finals since Maria Sharapova in 2004, has yet to claim a set in four meetings with the world No 1. The most recent of those defeats came barely a fortnight ago in San Diego, where Gauff was subjected to a 6-0, 6-3 mauling, but the most significant was at the French Open this summer, where the 18-year-old’s first grand slam final ended in similarly humbling fashion.
Gauff, however, is an old head on young shoulders (another quality shared by Swiatek), and her unshakable belief that a loss can be a win if lessons are learned has seen her rebound from that setback quite magnificently. An outstanding summer hard-court season has brought quarter-final finishes in California, Toronto, New York, San Diego and Guadalajara. Riding high at No 4 in the rankings, Gauff regards the prospect of another tilt at Swiatek as an opportunity to be embraced.
“It’s going to be a tough match,” said the American. “I haven’t beaten her yet. It’s an opportunity just to try again and hopefully see what I can do. I definitely learned a lot from that match in San Diego.”
The good news for both Kasatkina and Gauff is that the round-robin format means their semi-final hopes do not rest solely on finding a way past the Pole. The bad news is that the fourth member of Tracy Austin Group is Caroline Garcia, the summer’s form player, whose season’s haul of three titles – second only to Swiatek – is all the more impressive for having been achieved on three different surfaces. The Frenchwoman, who defeated Gauff en route to the US Open semi-finals and scored a stunning upset over Swiatek in Warsaw this summer, has demonstrated that she has the potential to beat anyone.
Less certain is how Garcia will rebound from her recent split with Bertrand Perret, the experienced French coach who took up the reins from her father, Louis Paul, at the end of last year. The influence of Perret, who reinforced Garcia’s commitment to the bold, first-strike style that once carried her to No 4 in the world, has been a central factor in her summer renaissance. By all accounts it was a messy divorce. – “In recent weeks, there have been problems,” Perret recently told L’Equipe – and though both parties have since made amicable noises, Garcia is aware of the need to retain focus and clarity.
“[Perret] decided to leave the team after Mexico, and I respected the decision,” said Garcia, who will be supported in Texas by Juan Pablo Guzmán, a former top-100 player who has already worked with her this year. “Now I have to be focused on the present, on the action, my best preparation I can have to play this tournament.
“It’s a big one. So I have to keep my mind clear and just be focused on the moment.”
The greatest threat to Swiatek’s aspirations is likely to come from Ons Jabeur, the Tunisian trailblazer who heads up Nancy Richey Group. A beaten finalist at Wimbledon and the US Open, the 28-year-old world No 2 is not only the first Arab or African woman to reach a major final but also the highest-ranked. Eager to take the final step to a first big title – her victory at the Madrid Open in May remains her most significant win to date – Jabeur, one of four debutants at this year’s season finale, skipped San Diego and Guadalajara to hone her preparations.
“The choice of just training and making myself stronger physically will definitely help me be ready for this tournament and also for next year,” said Jabeur, who will open her challenge against Aryna Sabalenka, the powerful Belarusian who has won the two most recent of their three meetings.
“It’s not the best to start playing against Aryna, with all the balls coming very fast,” added Jabeur. “It’s going to be tough. Whoever is going to be more solid on the court is going to win.”
A slow, low-bouncing indoor court should help Jabeur to nullify Sabalenka’s power and bring her slice and touch to bear. Yet, in a group that also includes Maria Sakkari and Jessica Pegula, the Tunisian will have her work cut out, not least because Sakkari and Sabalenka could be forgiven for approaching the finals as a free hit. Both have struggled to build on their outstanding achievements last year, when they each made two grand slam semi-finals, and the fact that they have made it to Texas at all is testimony to their enduring quality and grit.
Sabalenka, whose serve began to desert her this time last year in Guadalajara before going completely AWOL in Australia, has endured a particularly torrid time of it. Yet she has shown enormous mental strength, learning to drown out the external noise and place faith in other elements of her game. That was nowhere more apparent than at the US Open, where she salvaged her season by saving two match points against Kaia Kanepi in the second round before going on to repeat last year’s run to the semi-finals.
Through all her travails, Sabalenka’s ability to laugh at herself has remained endearingly intact.
“Just don’t listen anybody,” she said in response to an inquiry about the best advice she has received. “Follow your, like – I don’t know how to say – journey and just don’t give a fuck about what people are saying. Sorry, there’s no way to say it differently. This is just the only one way.”
Sakkari has shown similar resolve, not least in Guadalajara, where she secured qualification for the finals at the 11th hour with a tenacious three-set win over Veronika Kudermetova en route to her second WTA 1000 final of the year. The Greek could hardly have anticipated that her season would hinge on that last-ditch effort in March, when she reached a career-high ranking of third, but she has never stopped fighting.
“I’m very excited that a very challenging season is going to finish in a very good way, no matter how it goes here,” said Sakkari. “It’s just a reward that I’m in this tournament.”
That leaves Pegula, who arrives in Fort Worth on the crest of a wave after a barnstorming run in Guadalajara, where she defeated a quartet of former grand slam champions in Elena Rybakina, Bianca Andreescu, Sloane Stephens and Victoria Azarenka, before dismantling Sakkari in straight sets to claim her first WTA 1000 title. Up to No 3 in the world, the 28-year-old has been a fixture at the sharp end of tournaments this year, reaching three grand slam quarter-finals as well as the Madrid Open final. Now, having won the biggest title of her career, Pegula looks primed for further success – even if she remains as understated as ever.
“It’s a huge honour,” said Pegula of claiming a place among the elite for the first time. “I think we’re just all really excited to be here.
“Obviously you want to win, but at the same time to me it feels different because it’s not a tournament. It’s a different format, less players.
“It’s just a different week, but it’s kind of a fun way to cap off the year. So, again, it feels kind of more like a reward, but an earned reward. It’s satisfying.”
If Pegula is to continue on her upward trajectory, she will need to find a way past Swiatek, who stopped her not only at Roland Garros and Flushing Meadows but also in the Miami and San Diego semi-finals. Asked in Guadalajara whether she could go deeper in the majors next season, she quipped: “Hopefully, as long as I don’t play Iga in the quarterfinals.”
Therein lies the problem for the rest of the field in Fort Worth. Perhaps they should take a leaf out of Jabeur’s book. Kitted out in a full Halloween costume, the Tunisian scared the living daylights out of Swiatek by creeping up behind her while she was conducting her pre-tournament media duties. The Pole has not looked so terrified since she last saw a grass court. The WTA Finals nonetheless feel like hers to lose.