This week on Beyond Top 10 Tennis featured the Billie Jean King Cup through to Monte Carlo and Nadal’s return to Barcelona with a significant emphasis on some key ranking progressions and regressions. If you haven’t tuned in already, I’d encourage you to do so to get a better grasp of where we’re going and how this is being shaped to afford further context to a Top 10 tennis player, their ranking and ultimate standing when it comes to claiming that maiden Grand Slam or notching up that extra two, three, four or more.
First and foremost, the BJK Cup is a far cry from the original Fed Cup and its ‘brother‘ — the Davis Cup. The ties are smaller and done so in a shorter period and the crowds are a little lacklustre in comparison to what use to be. That said, I’ll be the first one to say that irrespective of these changes it has helped players on both the WTA and ATP tours with their scheduling. Quite frankly, they’re over-cooked come end of year when these events would take place and/or would miss out on valuable points if they opted to play. Simply put, players shouldn’t need to make a choice — the calendar should open up for them to play.
Interestingly, this is exactly what the WTA did this week with only a handful of smaller tournaments that were in action and/or underway. The same isn’t necessarily the case for the ATP but it comes pretty close. Arguably and for some reason unknown to be frank, the ATP still offers more tournaments in contrast to the WTA for players to not simply participate in and/or play, but offer the very fact of affording a ‘livelihood’ from their sport. And that’s the catch. Equal prize money should be on both sides of the playing field.
Money, money, and a little bit more. From the WTA succumbing to the dollars and saying yes to the season finale to be held in Saudi Arabia is an absolute pitfall of the game. Honestly, it’s incredibly sad. Super disheartening and all the rest. Why did the WTA need to go so ‘low‘ as to say yes to a country that does not have a universal level of equality throughout their country? Granted it is a women’s sport and the best of these women for the 2024 season will be now going there to play the season ending Championships but it is now somehow a terribly ironic situation granted that women who call this country home are not afforded the same levels of respect and freedom.
Two primary pillars the WTA has fought incredibly hard for and with the BJK Cup qualifiers playing out the past week, it’s a timely reminder that the WTA really needs a shake-up at the top to put these women and their rights front and centre in contrast to making poor ‘monetary’ decisions.
The ATP is booming in comparison. Yes, more tournaments throughout the year for prize money to be up for grabs. Sure, they’ve also gone for the money-grab especially in reference to the Davis Cup and the shamble that has followed, but women’s rights is something the WTA has actually fought for in contrast to the ATP not necessarily making these inroads simply because men were never at a disadvantage. That said, the ATP has gone as far as starting to offer minimum prize pursues for players ranked outside the Top 100 to ensure they can make a living whilst the WTA has yet to take any (public) action in this respect.
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What is equally upsetting in this regard is that first and foremost, I’m a huge fan of Nadal — I mean, who isn’t? Though his recent association with Saudi Arabia isn’t doing the WTA any favours. Sure, there have been other names associating with the country but both Nadal and Federer have lifted tennis to another level. I can see where they’re coming from by all accounts, but with a woman’s safety needing to be the #1 priority this still remains upsetting on a wider scale and deserves the full attention of both governing bodies to restructure their approach on inclusion and where events are held.
This week has also been quite a significant one in respect to player rankings with emphasis on our predictive analytics and the anticipation of results. What does that mean? Well, for some time now I’ve been sharing a few primary insights from our data with key player indicators. In January it was Fritz who was noted as regressing outside the Top 10 and possibly a brief stint back inside the Top 10 prior to regressing once again. Check. Next was de Minaur who would break into the Top 10 — double check! Whilst de Minaur is just outside the Top 10 at this stage, this is really a matter of time and a game of points on the line. Insofar as performance is concerned, de Minaur remains ripe for the Top 10. Then there was Tsitsipas, however, with those additional points from Monte Carlo he has surged back inside the Top 10 when in reality it should really look like a #10 and/or #9 ranking at best. Rudd’s ranking progression is slightly different as he has been making traction this year and he was predicted to be more comfortably inside the 8% by now — double check-check. Next comes Rune who has been predicted this season to regress outside the Top 10 and this has finally come to fruition. Of no fault of his own, granted he did actually have a reasonable performance at Monte Carlo, rather it really is his level and results up until now that have finally caught up to his ranking and as such aligns with his current level of play.
By all means, if Rune pieces together his performance from Monte Carlo and continue to build on this momentum, then he will be back inside the Top 10 come the French Open.
And what about the WTA tour? Given that is was a relatively quiet week on tour with the BJK Cup underway, there were some surprise performances. Svitolina went down and so did Garcia. Radacanu and Osaka picked up some solid wins. Pegula had some tight matches and Swiatek breezed through. Overall, Swiatek was the primary player in action this week whose performances aligned with her ranking whereas a number of other players did not necessary align with their ranking whilst those ranked outside the Top 100 (i.e. Radacanu and Osaka) delivered. Arguably, Osaka has been playing in line with a Top 50 ranking and at times, a Top 20 ranking with some fluctuations. Therefore those results are of no surprise. The bigger surprise was Radacanu taking the win over Garcia — a noteworthy performance. Yet there were some key players missing from action this week but that is also due to team selection, availability and current ranking. Without getting into the politics of it all, it’s fair to say some teams had more robust and well-rounded players inside the Top 20 that were in action whilst some teams were quite simply underdone.
Last but not least, Nadal deserves more of the limelight. Despite not going further at Barcelona he had an almighty task against de Minaur. Sure, even a season or two ago Nadal would have been the favourite and on clay I’d say he’s favourite any day of the week but unfortunately for Nadal, his body won’t allow him to play the level of tennis we know he’s capable of playing and de Minaur took the advantage.
However, don’t be fooled, not every player would have been able to achieve this result with the sheer aura of Nadal forcing many to their knees before the first ball.
My primary hope for Nadal, of course albeit bias, is for him to lift his Roland Garros trophy one final time and if it’s not to be, for his run at the French to be solid, deep and if someone is to take Rafa down for it to be in 5 brutal sets that leave his opponent knackered but also, if they’re good enough to overcome him on clay, then for them to be good enough to go all the way and lift the trophy as the ultimate reward.
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