The top eight players for the season on the WTA will be heading to Singapore to kick off the WTA Finals on October 22nd. Across the season, points are collected for tournament performances and the top eight players in the qualification points ranking get to compete at the Finals. The points come from sixteen tournaments and the four Grand Slams, the four Premier Mandatory events and the best results from two of the Premier 5 events must be included in the sixteen.
The event has gone through some changes in its history and this is actually the 47th edition of the WTA Finals. The whole thing goes off at the Singapore Indoor Stadium. Along with the main singles event, there will be a doubles event running alongside as well. The reining singles champion is Dominika Cibulkova who couldn’t make it back to the event this season after struggling for most of the campaign. There are World Ranking points up for grabs in this one and the top seven seeds are all in contention to end the year as number 1. It’s that tight. Simona Halep is trading as 4/1 favourite at William Hill for this latest edition.
Format
The tournament starts off with a round robin event of two groups of four. Each player plays each of the other players in the group and the top two from each group then advances to the semi finals. The winner of each group will face the runners up from the other group. What will split players if things are tied are the greatest number of wins, then the greatest number of matches played and then head-to-head results if just two players are tied. If three players are tied it will go to things like highest percentage of sets won.
Qualified Players (in order of seeding)
1 Simona Halep, 2 Garbine Muguruza, 3 Karolina Pliskova, 4 Elina Svitolina, 5 Venus Williams, 6 Caroline Wozniacki, 7 Jelena Ostapenko, 8 Caroline Garcia
WTA FInals Winner Odds
Simona Halep 4/1, Garbine Muguruza 7/2, Karolina Pliskova 11/2, Caroline Garcia 6/1, Elina Svitolina 11/2, Jelena Ostapenko 7/1, Caroline Wozniacki 8/1, Venus Williams 9/1.
Simona Halep
The Romanian posted a very good 44-15 record over the course of the season. She has had something of a character building season after disappointments last term and she has been one of the most consistent performers all season. But she has only collected the one title this year and that was a title defence at the Mutua Madrid Open. She also got to the French Open Final and came runner up in three other events (Rome, Cincinnati and Beijing). Over 60% of her points, this season in the world rankings happened on clay. She is back in the WTA Finals for the fourth season running, so has consistency. It was a strong season because she only won two matches through January and February. Muguruza is probably her biggest challenge in this tournament as she trails 1-3 in the head to head against the Spaniard.
Garbine Muguruza
Muguruza has collected two titles this season, destroying Halep 6-1 6-0 in the final of Cincinnati and winning Wimbledon. So overall, strong stuff from the young Spaniard and she carries a 46-19 record for the season into this one and only Pliskova and Svitolina have won more matches than she has this season. Like Halep, she has had her time as World Number One this season. She’s always fun to watch as she plays some seriously high-risk tennis which of course, doesn’t’ always pay off but she is less reserved than Halep is although clay is her preferred surface. Muguruza’s biggest threat is Pliskova as she holds a poor 2-6 head to head record against the Czech player.
Karolina Pliskova
At one stage of the season, Pliskova looked unstoppable. There have been three titles for her this season, beating Johanna Konta and Caroline Wozniacki on the way to winning Eastbourne, beating Wozniacki in Doha after opening with a title in Brisbane in her first tournament of the year. She hasn’t been in any great form particularly though since a quarter final run at the US Open and there were signs of tiredness creeping into her game towards the end of the season. She also has had time as World Number One this season. The good thing for Pliskova, who is taking in a 51-16 record for the season, is that she has a positive head to head leads over Muguruza and Svitolina. But she trials Halep badly with just one win ever over the Romanian.
Elina Svitolina
The Ukrainian has a 52-12 record for the season, which is brilliant and that gives her more wins this season than any of the other eight. She has also claimed five titles this season as well. She can’t be counted out of this and qualified comfortably for the Finals. She hasn’t really done anything of note on her brief appearances since the US Open, but she has plenty in the tank to really make a strong challenge at the tournament. She has a great mental approach and she matches up evenly with most of the field going into this one aside from Pliskova who she trails 1-5 in the head to head against, so will be hoping to avoid her. She makes a good option
Venus Williams
It has been a fantastic season from Williams who just keeps going and going at the top level. She hasn’t landed a title this year but she has had her moments. She lost to her sister at the Australian Open, got the semi finals of Miami, the final of Wimbledon where she lost to Muguruza and reached the semi’s of the US Open as well where she was stopped by Sloane Stephens. It’s been a fine season from the 37 year old. She has won the tournament once, back in 2008 and finished runner up in her only other appearances at the finals the following year.
Caroline Wozniacki
The Dane has quietly had a pretty good season and carries a 56-20 season record into the WTA Finals. She has picked up a title this year and it was in the recent Asian swing as well when she beat Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the final of Tokyo. Her previous appearance at the WTA Finals was in 2010 when she finished runner up to Kim Clijsters. Going into this one she has never won a game against either Svitolina, Williams or Ostapenko so may struggle to go all the way in the tournament.
Jelena Ostapenko
The surprise package of this year got to the WTA Finals remarkably and that is on the back of her main success which was the Grand Slam title at the French Open. Ostapenko has been a revelation this season with brave hitting and just tireless running. She proved that her Grand Slam win wasn’t a fluke as she took the Seoul title as well recently and she went to the quarter finals of Wimbledon as well. She has also been to the semi finals of Wuhan and the semi finals of Beijing on the Asian swing. As good of a dark horse bet that you will find in WTA Finals beting at William Hill at the moment. Stacks of value on her as an underdog.
Caroline Garcia
The young French battler has had a tremendous end to the season and so she is going to be popular because of her form. She is an underdog for the tournament though but her back to back titles in Wuhan and Beijing puts her at the top of her game at the moment. It was her run in Beijing which really impressed though because she beat Svitolina, Petra Kvitova and then Simona Halep in the final of the tournament. That was some statement from her. She doesn’t have a positive head to head record against any of the other seven players in the tournament though.
WTA Finals History
Martina Navtaivoa is the most successful player in the history of the WTA Finals, having won the title eight times. Of current players, Serena Williams is the leader with five titles and she is level with Steffi Graf in this history of wins at the tournament. Venus Williams is the only other player in this field who has happened to have won it before. Caroline Garcia, Je?ena Ostapenko and Elina Svitolina are all making their debuts in the event this year.
Predictions
Young Ostapenko can really have a great run at this and is value to book a place in at least the semi finals in this one. She is just carrying form and the other one is Garcia. Whether Garcia can sustain now against the best in the game is going to be the question surrounding her. As for the big guns in the field, the battle between Halep and Muguruza may well be the key factor. Halep has done a lot of good work this season and would be a justifiable winner, but her mental strength in clutch matches is still in doubt. Muguruza has the form over her so is the pick of the top two at William Hill.
