Howdy, y’all and Happy Tennis Tuesday! Though we’re a couple of days into the WTA Finals Riyadh, I think it’s important to break down the groups and matchups and how things can unfold. In case you weren’t aware, the eight players are broken into two groups and will each battle it out against one another instead of a win-or-lose tournament setup.
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Each round-robin win is worth three points. If players are tied at the conclusion of the group stage, the head-to-head winner advances. If there is a three-way tie, the tiebreaker will be determined by matches played, total sets won and total games won. The top two players from each group will advance to the semifinals with the group winners facing off against the No. 2 players. Then the winners of those matches will play in the championship match.
Here are the groupings:
Stefanie Graf Group
(1) Aryna Sabalenka
(3) Coco Gauff
(5) Jessica Pegula
(8) Jasmine Paolini
Serena Williams Group
(2) Iga Swiatek
(4) Amanda Anisimova
(6) Elena Rybakina
(7) Madison Keys
First, lets go just recap the results that have happened so far:
November 1
Rybakina def. Ansimova 6-3, 6-1
Swiatek def. Keys 6-1, 6-2
November 2
Pegula def. Gauff 6-3, 6-7(4), 6-2
Sabalenka def. Paolini 6-3, 6-1
November 3
Anisimova def. Keys 4-6, 6-3, 6-2
Rybakina def. Swiatek 3-6, 6-1, 6-0
With two out of three matches completed in the Serena Williams group, it’s pretty cut-and-dry. Elena Rybakina has advanced to the semifinals and has won their group, while Iga Swiatek and Amanda Anisimova will face off for the second berth. Madison Keys has been eliminated from contending for the semifinals.
For the Stefanie Graf group, Aryna Sabalenka plays Jessica Pegula today, while reigning champion Coco Gauff and Jasmine Paolini face off. Should Sabalenka win, she will make the semifinals. If Sabalenka and Paolini are the winners, Sabalenka advances as the group winner and Gauff is eliminated and the winner of the Pegula/Paolini match will determine Rybakina’s opponent. If Gauff wins a set, Paolini is eliminated, while any other outcome would result in the final matches being played on Thursday.
So, what’s going to happen? For today’s matches, I think Aryna Sabalenka will take out Jessica Pegula first. Sabalenka holds an 8-3 head-to-head advantage against the American and looked impressive in her opener. In this group, she’s looked the most comfortable out of the players and you could argue for all eight players. While Pegula’s win over Gauff was impressive, one could argue that Gauff’s serving woes and erratic errors guided the result than anything else. That being said, Pegula did recently upset Sabalenka in the Wuhan semifinals and she’s split two WTA Finals matchups. Still, I’ll take Sabalenka in two. For the Gauff-Paolini match, I’m going with Gauff in straight sets to knock out Paolini. Though they’ve split their six meetings and both have had some late-season momentum, I’d argue that Gauff is in stronger form.
For the remaining round robin matches, I think Rybakina will go 3-0 with a win over Keys and while the Swiatek-Anisimova match could be interesting, Swiatek is usually just too strong at the WTA Finals and I’ll pick her experience to guide her to second place. The final day, I think Sabalenka will knock out Gauff, while Pegula will seal a semifinal showing with a straight-sets win over Paolini.
So, should that happen, we’ll have Elena Rybakina vs. Jessica Pegula and Aryna Sabalenka vs. Iga Swiatek. Given form in this week’s matches, I’ll take a Rybakina-Sabalenka final with Sabalenka finishing her impressive 2025 campaign to solidify herself as the WTA’s top player.
Now, on to links!
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This Week in Women’s Tennis
The WTA announced that Valerie Camillo will be its new Chair, replacing Steve Simon on November 17. She comes from a background in the NBA, NHL and MLB.
Janice Tjen continued her incredible first full season as a professional by capturing her first WTA title at the Chennai Open, defeating Kimberly Birrell in the final. She also won the doubles title with Aldila Sutjiadi, downing Storm Hunter and Monica Niculescu.
Victoria Mboko won her second title of the year at the Prudential Hong Kong Tennis Open, outlasting Cristina Bucsa in the longest final of the year. In doubles, Jiang Xinyu and Wang Yafan defeated Momoko Kobori and Peangtarn Plipuech.
At the Jiangxi Open, Anna Blinkova downed surprise finalist Lilli Tagger and delighted fans with her Mandarin. The doubles crown was won by Quinn Gleason and Elena Pridankina, who bested Ekaterina Ovcharenko and Emily Webley-Smith.
After formally retiring, Alize Cornet has been appointed as captain of France’s Billie Jean King Cup team.
Ons Jabeur assured fans that she’s not retiring and you will see her back on court, but she has no exact timeline.
Danielle Collins is on the dating app train and…..it’s exactly what you’d expect:
Lets go back, back to the beginning WTA rankings, where Chris Evert was the first WTA No. 1.
Alison Riske-Amritraj updated fans and said while she has a protected ranking, she’s not sure if she’ll come back:
Kaitlin Quevedo changed nationalities from the United States to Spain and two years after, she’s becoming a player to watch break the Top 100 next year.
Tweet of the Week
Congratulations to Emily Webley-Smith, a player super kind to a 16-year-old fan at a small ITF in Atlanta in 2008, for continuing the grind and breaking through at 41!
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Five at The IX: WTA Finals Media Day
Q. This year you’ve made eight finals, almost twice as many as any player on tour. You’ve won four events, most on tour. When you look back on the season, do you look at the wins that defined your season or the moments that slipped away as a way to get better?
ARYNA SABALENKA: As I look back at the season?
Q. Yeah.
ARYNA SABALENKA: I don’t look back (laughter).
I think there is no wins without tough losses. I think it’s a balance. It’s all about how you recover after tough losses, what lessons you’re learning, how open you are to improvement and to learn something new.
When I look back in the season, I am super proud because I had tough experience at the beginning, but I never stopped working hard, I never stopped trying my best. I always think like, Okay, what else I have to improve to get better? We talk a lot about those lessons, what we have to improve with my team. It just all pays off later. I look back thinking, yeah, I’m super proud.
Was amazing season so far. Even, like, thinking about those finals, I’m still happy was fight, great matches, great battles. Yeah, I miss maybe some opportunities, but it just didn’t mean to be. I had to learn something to come back stronger and to win some tournaments.
Q. For the past two or three years tennis has been having a big moment coming into pop culture. There’s not a single designer that doesn’t have a tennis line right now. Do you think tennis is doing enough to benefit from this moment? If you had any ideas of what more can be done to get more into pop culture…
COCO GAUFF: If I have to give my honest answer, no, I don’t think that tennis is doing enough to benefit from that, considering I’ve gotten the lucky chance to meet so many celebrities because of tennis, how many are actively really into it, know everything. Couple people I’ve met doing book clubs on the sport, people you wouldn’t expect.
Yeah, I think there’s some more that we can do. I mean, me being like a (indiscernible), I think the TikTok audience can be reached a lot more. TikTok is one of those’s that just transcends everything and makes connections.
We have users who are making fashion TikTok. We have tennis influencers doing their things. That’s just done on their own. We can do more as a sport of capitalizing off of it, marketing it.
Yeah, I mean, I don’t think it’s necessarily the players’ job. I feel like that part of doing the job, I just saw Jannik did Gucci. We’re doing as a player good jobs. I think the tours and slams can capitalize off it more.
Q. What were some of your pre-season goals? How did they manifest themselves in the season?
JESSICA PEGULA: I think some of my pre-season goals, you’re talking about coming into this season, last year, they were very, I don’t know, I think I came off such a big accomplishment, making my first Grand Slam at the US Open, that can be like a really big high.
I felt like going into Asia, I kind of hit a lull. I wasn’t really that healthy to be honest when I came here last year. I was really struggling with a knee injury.
Off-season was really to get healthy, to get my movement back, to feel like I was ready to go play in Australia, which I was able to do.
With my team, we were honestly focused on competing every single match, not feeling like I gave in or I succumbed to my emotions or frustrations at any point in the match. I think I was able to do that really, really well this year, being able to win tournaments on different surfaces, especially this last swing, a lot of three sets, up-and-down matches. I think mentally I was able to compete every single point.
That was honestly something that we really, really worked on. Another one was obviously to do well at the slams. Was hit or miss a little bit there, but still was able to put up a strong showing at the US Open, which coming back, not playing that great in the summer, then being able to still back up another really great result coming off of a final, I think that gave me a lot of confidence, as well, just to end the year on a good note.
I don’t know. My pre-season goals I think are always pretty broad and changing throughout the year. There’s so many different challenges you face in the year. I think depending on what’s happening, I try to adapt those goals as I go. They can kind of vary.
But I like to keep them relatively small because I think that’s how I end up getting the bigger goals accomplished.
Q. It’s been 23 years since four Americans have reached the WTA Finals. What does it mean to you to be part of this elite American squad? Would you consider it more of a competitiveness or a camaraderie to be with the rest of the American players?
MADISON KEYS: I think it’s amazing. It’s obviously been a long time. There has also been really a lot of great American champions that have made it to the Finals.
Just to be a part of such a large group is really special. Being able to kind of have our name down in history I think is very fun.
We’re all quite close, so to be able to be here together… Jess and I grew up together. Then watching Amanda and Coco grow up before us has been really cool just to kind of get to not only watch two younger girls kind of take the tour by storm, but also to be able to be here with someone who I played juniors with.
Q. You’ve become well-known for your Nadal style prematch warm-ups. I know you are a very big fan of Rafa. How much has he influenced you as a player in terms of your game style, your mentality and attitude to training?
IGA SWIATEK: I think the mentality and attitude to training were the things that I could really take from him because obviously he’s a man and he’s always going to have, like, different game style. We can’t copy. Also you need to be really raised tennis-wise in a proper way to play really the same game style and everything. Obviously the tennis is different.
What I took from Rafa is, yeah, the way he never gave up. I could actually see it on some matches. I have some, like, flashes in my head where I’m, Well, there’s no chance I’m going to win this match, there’s no chance I can improve and change the momentum.
I actually saw him doing that sometimes. It gives me belief in myself a little bit more.
Yeah, honestly I really miss Rafa. I’ve been watching some video randomly. I’m like I wish I could see this live again. Glad I just had a chance to play tennis maybe at the same time as him, so I could experience it and find some inspiration.
For sure he inspired me the most from all the people in the world, yeah.
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