For the 49th time, the WTA’s eight best players will assemble to contest the WTA Finals. Much like its counterpart on the ATP Tour, the WTA Finals has been played around the globe. The first editions were contested in the United States, most notably in New York for over two decades, before the tournament headed to Europe. This decade alone, the nomadic event has been played in Doha, Istanbul, Singapore and now Shenzhen.
The Format
As has been the case since 2003, the eight players have been divided into two groups of four, this year Red and Purple, for a round robin with six matches to be played in each group. The winner and runner-up from each group will then advance to the semifinals, with the winner from the Red Group facing the Purple Group’s runner-up and vice versa to set the field for Sunday’s final, the last match of the 2019 WTA season.
Red Group has brought together the current Roland Garros champion and world #1 Ashleigh Barty and Australian Open champion Naomi Osaka, as well as 2011 WTA Finals winner Petra Kvitova and first-time qualifier Belinda Bencic. Purple Group, meanwhile, boasts the US Open champion Bianca Andreescu and the winner at the All England Cub Simona Halep, who will compete against world #2 Karolina Pliskova and defending champion Elina Svitolina.
The Data
Astonishingly, Barty has never played a WTA Tour match on an indoor hard court. That lack of experience of indoor conditions is something the Australian shares with her fellow young guns with Osaka having played just five matches indoors and Andreescu only two. That is a reflection of the truncated WTA season and the general paucity of indoor tennis in the women’s game as compared with the men’s, which boasts two European indoor swings.
It is Kvitova, who has had an inconsistent season, who is by far the most experienced indoors, with the Czech owning a superb record in indoor conditions. She owns an elite level hold/break percentage of 109%, which is unmatched by the rest of the field in Shenzhen. But it is Andreescu who has the best record against fellow members of the top ten, albeit from a limited sample size, which will surely give her real confidence heading into the WTA Finals.
Indeed, until her defeat at Osaka’s hands in the China Open quarterfinals, the Canadian had never lost against top-ten opposition, winning her first eight matches. Svitolina, in contrast, after going undefeated at the WTA Finals last year, has just one win to her name against fellow members of the top ten, beating world #9 Madison Keys in Flushing Meadows. That is despite reaching back-to-back Grand Slam semifinals at Wimbledon and the US Open.
Osaka, meanwhile, is the form player coming into Shenzhen, having won her last ten matches in a row, picking up titles in Osaka and Beijing. The Japanese star had lost her way after winning her second Grand Slam at the Australian Open in January, but has evidently rediscovered her best tennis in recent weeks, although Andreescu, who alongside Barty and Bencic is playing the WTA Finals for the first time, has the best winning percentage in 2019.
Red Group
Osaka and Bencic both bring excellent form into this tournament. Bencic, in particular, seems to thrive at this time of year and to enjoy playing in Asia. But Barty is not the top seed in Shenzhen for nothing. Though she has not quite managed to dominate since winning the French Open in June, she has had some fine results since and enjoyed a productive spell during the Asian swing, reaching the last four in Wuhan and the final in Beijing, where she beat Kvitova in the quarterfinals.
However, when the all-time head-to-head records of the players are taken into account it is Kvitova who has had the best of things. She has dominated against Bencic, having never lost to the Swiss, and until their meeting in Beijing, had done the same against Barty. However, she did lose her only previous match against Osaka, who in turn has a terrible record against Bencic. The Swiss and Barty, meanwhile, have never before met on tour.
But with all things considered, it is hard to look past Osaka as the favourite to top Red Group. The Japanese is almost unstoppable when she gets on a roll and, whilst her momentum may have been slightly stalled by a three-week period away from the tour, she is clearly full of confidence. Barty may also feel good about her chances. She has been impressively consistent all year which should stand her in good stead at its close and she clearly enjoys playing on the big stage.
Semifinalists: first Osaka, second Barty
Purple Group
Red Group looks set for a thrilling battle for a semifinal place between four in-form players, Purple Group less so. Halep may be the Wimbledon champion, but the Romanian has, for the most part, been in abject form since her run to the title in SW19. Her last three defeats have come against world #39 Ekaterina Alexandrova, world #49 Elena Rybakina and, an admittedly inspired, world #116 Taylor Townsend. Her poor record at the Tour Finals also counts against her.
Svitolina scored the win of her life in Singapore last year and on paper has had a fine 2019 season. But the Ukrainian has delivered few truly standout performances this year and her awful record against the top ten makes it hard to imagine her picking up the two wins she will need to progress to the knockout stages. That, by process of elimination leaves Andreescu and Pliskova as the most likely semifinalists from Purple Group.
The Canadian saw her 19-match winning streak snapped last time out by Osaka in Beijing, but that should not detract from the excellent season the teenager has put together. Despite a lengthy spell out with injury that saw her miss most of the spring and summer, Andreescu arrives in Shenzhen having won titles in Indian Wells and Cincinnati, as well as the US Open. Pliskova, meanwhile, has struggled in the past at the WTA Finals, but she has a winning record against Svitolina and should be able to get the better of the out-of-form Halep.
Semifinalists: first Andreescu, second Pliskova
Who will win the WTA Finals?
The WTA Finals is typically a very difficult tournament to predict. The last three winners Dominika Cibulkova, Caroline Wozniacki and Svitolina were all outsiders at the beginning of the week. And with three of the field this year making their WTA Finals debut, the action in Shenzhen could be even more unpredictable than usual. But with a number of exciting young stars as well as some more established names, the WTA’s showpiece event certainly highlights the great shape the women’s game is in.
And the headline acts are surely Osaka and Andreescu, whose first meeting in Beijing earlier this month was utterly gripping. If they are to renew their rivalry in Shenzhen, it won’t be until the semifinals or possibly the final, but don’t bet against it with both women having played some fine tennis of late. In fact, Osaka’s form has been so impressive that it is currently hard to see anyone else ending up with the trophy at the end of the week.
Champion: Osaka
Main photo:
Embed from Getty Images
