For those who put their faith in numbers, predicting the winner of this year’s WTA Finals should be simplicity itself. The sixth seed has been crowned champion at four of the past five editions of the season-ending showpiece, and this year that spot belongs to Ons Jabeur. If the pattern holds, expect the power of six to propel the Tunisian to the biggest win of her career.
Given the blustery conditions in the Mexican resort city of Cancún, Jabeur’s quick hands and exquisite feel may well put her among the title favourites. To most observers, however, the figure that really matters is No 1. That is the position Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek will dispute at the final stop on this season’s WTA Tour, where the champion will pocket up to 1,500 points – enough to either bridge or expand the 630-point gap between the two best players on the planet.
For the past seven weeks, bragging rights in the race to claim the year-end No 1 ranking have belonged to Sabalenka, who will be hoping to end the year in the same triumphant vein she began it when she stormed to a maiden grand slam title at the Australian Open. The mighty Belarusian, the first woman since Serena Williams in 2016 to reach the semi-finals or better at all four majors in the same calendar year, realised a lifelong ambition at last month’s US Open, rising to top spot for the first time despite losing to Coco Gauff in the final. The magnitude of that achievement is not lost on the 25-year-old, but neither has it gone to her head.
“I wish I had known earlier that I can play that good,” quipped Sabalenka on the eve of her opener against Sakkari. “It’s just [been a] super great season, I think the best season in my life so far.
“[But] I think ranking, it’s just ranking, you know? It’s not like I go on court right now and everyone will be, ‘OK, I’m not playing, you’re No 1, good luck in the next round.’ It’s not changing anything. I still need to work hard. I still need to bring my best tennis on court. I think I even need to work more, because right now I feel like I’m a target for everyone.”
The latter sentiment is one Swiatek will recognise only too well. The Pole spoke of the pressures of playing with a target on her back as long ago as March, long before a fourth-round defeat to Jelena Ostapenko at Flushing Meadows drew a line under her 75-week reign at No 1. Swiatek reiterated that stance earlier this month at the China Open, her only tournament since, expressing her relief at being able to return to the practice court unencumbered by the “baggage” that goes with the top ranking. She certainly had the air of a player liberated, showcasing some intriguing technical and tactical improvements as she claimed her first WTA 1000 title of the season.
That newfound adaptability, evident in Beijing in a relentless display of net-rushing against Sara Sorribes Tormo, and a flawless exhibition of controlled aggression in the final against Liudmila Samsonova, bodes well for Cancún, where the combination of swirling wind and a hastily-laid playing surface that has allowed scant practice time will be challenging for all the players. The need for Swiatek to tailor her game accordingly will be particularly acute given that she starts against Marketa Vondrousova, the wily Czech southpaw who outfoxed Jabeur at Wimbledon to become the first unseeded women’s champion in history. Not given to complacency, the French Open champion will be taking nothing for granted.
“You can always say the first two seeds are going to be the favourites, or the first seed,” said Swiatek, who has also been drawn alongside Gauff and Jabeur in Chetumal Group. “But honestly, so many things can happen this week. Overall, in any tennis tournament, I stopped thinking that way. I think any one of us can win this tournament.
“I felt like [last year, when Swiatek compiled a 37-match winning streak and won Roland Garros and the US Open] was just kind of ridiculous, because people got used to me winning. It’s not like it’s going to happen all the time. So I think this season was kind of more normal, I would say, like most of the seasons we play, for even the top players.
“The main thing I want to avoid is forgetting that this was also a good season and I still won some great tournaments.
“Expectations from the outside, it was the thing that really sometimes stopped me this season. I’m going to work on not letting it stop me this time.”
In truth, little has stopped the 22-year-old this season. While Sabalenka has been the dominant force at the majors – although not in Paris, where Swiatek was crowned champion for the third time in four years – the Pole has won five titles and 63 matches, more than any of her peers. Samsonova, against whom Swiatek did not make a single unforced error in the Beijing final, caused quite a stir when she recently branded her rival “the real No 1”, yet it was easy to see what the Russian meant. Sabalenka’s superior grand slam record this season unquestionably makes her the rightful No 1 and yet, in the hard currency of trophies and victories, Swiatek has been the more successful player.
If Sabalenka is to alter that skewed perception, she will need to combine a strong showing in Bacalar Group with a repeat of last year’s run to the final. Should she collect two wins from a group that includes Elena Rybakina, Jessica Pegula and Sakkari and then advance to the final, Swiatek will be powerless to stop her. Anything less, and the Pole will be in charge of her own destiny, although she would still probably need to win the title with an unblemished group record.
Yet, if the tournament unfolds along similar lines to recent editions, the battle for No 1 could yet be overshadowed. Should range and adaptability prove the determining factors, Jabeur and Vondrousova could emerge as disruptors-in-chief. With no previous winners in the field, either woman would be a fitting addition to a roster of left-field champions that includes Caroline Wozniacki, Elina Svitolina, Garbiñe Muguruza and Caroline Garcia.
Victory for Jabeur would mark a fairy-tale conclusion to a chequered season that has included knee surgery and a heart-breaking defeat in the Wimbledon final for the second successive year. Neither a first French Open quarter-final nor title wins in Charleston and Ningbo – the latter her first on hard courts – have brought solace in the face of a loss that the Tunisian has described as the most painful of her career. If there has been an upside, it is that she has acquired a knack of adjusting to circumstance.
“I learned to just adapt to everything,” said Jabeur, who opens against Gauff on Monday. “As a tennis player, I always try to adapt and not complain about a lot of things. Hopefully it will help me to play better. Definitely I will figure out how to play my best tennis in the wind.”
Vondrousova, whose quarter-final run at the US Open underlined how impressively she has adapted to life as a grand slam winner, will likewise look to make the most of her guile and tactical intelligence.
“I’m more crafty,” said the 24-year-old. “I don’t have as much power as other girls, maybe. I feel like I’m the smallest here, too. It’s a bit tough sometimes.
“Since I was small, I was always the smallest, so I had to find ways. I feel like my lefty [style] is also a bit annoying for other players. That’s what I’m trying to do, just to be annoying.”
Gauff, meanwhile, is hopeful that an upbringing in the swirling winds of Delray Beach, Florida will work to her advantage as she seeks to reproduce the winning blend of defence and attack that earned her the US Open title.
“I will need to adjust because the wind is quite heavy,” said the 19-year-old, who lost all through of her group matches in straight sets last year in Fort Worth. “For the past few days, when I’ve been trying to practice here, it’s been really tough.
“For sure, I’m going to stick to my game. I’m going to try to still play aggressive. Of course, the serve is a weapon, so I’ll try to do my best to adjust.”
With Swiatek the favourite, adjustment is likely to be the watchword in Chetumal Group, potentially giving Jabeur or Vondrousova a slight edge. Conversely, Bacalar Group will be shaped by a collision of irresistible forces, in the shape of Sabalenka and Rybakina, and immovable objects, in the form of Pegula and Sakkari. A quarter-final loss to Rybakina in Beijing notwithstanding, a Sabalenka wobble would be a major surprise. The wider outlook is harder to predict. Pegula has little to lose after drawing a blank on her debut in Fort Worth last year, while Rybakina, the fourth seed and former Wimbledon champion, has admitted to struggling with the wind in practice.
That leaves Sakkari, in as an alternate following the withdrawal of Karolina Muchova with a wrist injury, as a potential fly in the ointment for the trio of top-five players with whom she finds herself bracketed. A semi-finalist in each of her two previous appearances at the finals, the Greek world No 9 not only has the pedigree to get out of the group but also has a deep affinity for the host country, which she has come to see as a home for home. That feelgood factor, underlined by last month’s title win in Guadalajara, her first at WTA 1000 level, deepens the suspicion that Sakkari, effectively playing with house money, could emerge as the surprise package of the group.
“I just feel like the crowd loves me here, and I love them too,” said Sakkari. “I’ve said it many times: there’s a special connection. This week is like a celebration for me. I’m grateful to be here, to be competing again in the finals, because three times in a row is I think a great achievement.
“I’m just going to go out there and enjoy. It would be amazing to win the whole thing, that’s my ultimate goal, of course, but I don’t want to think of winning or losing. I just want to feel like, ‘You know what, I was given that great opportunity’ – and make the most out of it.”
Semi-finals: Swiatek to defeat Sakkari; Jabeur to defeat Sabalenka.
Final: Swiatek to beat Jabeur.