WTA Finals 2024 Lineup Confirmed: Who is heading to Riyadh?

Iga Swiatek - Indian Wells 2024, Aryna Sabalenka - Cincinnati Open 2024

October 17, 2024

Tennis News, Tennis Tournaments, WTA Tennis Players

WTA Finals 2024 Lineup Confirmed: Who is heading to Riyadh?

The lineup for the 2024 WTA Finals has been completed, with the top eight players from the season set to do battle in Riyadh next month.

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, was confirmed as the host of the year-end tournament back in April and will do so until 2026.

And we, at Tennishead, are going to run you through those players heading to the event in the Saudi capital:

1) Aryna Sabalenka

It will be of no surprise to see Aryna Sabalenka as the top qualifier for the WTA Finals this year, having had another very impressive season.

It all kicked off with her defending the Australian Open title, claiming victory in Melbourne without dropping a single set.

Although still producing impressive results, Sabalenka did not win another title until August in Cincinnati and she has not looked back since, going onto claim her third singles major at the US Open and most recently won her third consecutive Wuhan Open title.

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A post shared by Aryna Sabalenka (@arynasabalenka)

This is the fourth season in a row that Sabalenka has qualified for the WTA Finals, with her best result coming back in 2022 when she was runner-up to Caroline Garcia in Fort Worth.

There is also the added dynamic for Sabalenka in the battle to end the year as World No.1, and the 26-year-old is currently in poll position to do just that with Iga Swiatek dropping more points as defending champion.

2) Iga Swiatek

Despite holding onto her No.1 ranking by a thread at the moment, Iga Swiatek has still comfortably qualified for the WTA Finals for a fourth consecutive year like rival Sabalenka.

Swiatek began the season like a train, winning five tournaments, including a third consecutive Roland Garros title that put her ahead of Serena Williams in that regard.

🇫🇷 Merci Paris. You’re my favorite place to play, smile and wear some nice outfits once in a while. 🫶🏼 @rolandgarros pic.twitter.com/uVWxdAbdb4
— Iga Świątek (@iga_swiatek) June 9, 2024

All of Swiatek’s other titles won in that dominant spell were at WTA 1000 level, winning in Doha, Indian Wells, Madrid and Rome.

It has been a less strong second half to the season for Swiatek, who has not competed since losing in the US Open quarter-finals.

However, the Pole will be going into the year-end tournament feeling fresh and with new coach Wim Fissette by her side.

Last year, Swiatek handled the windy conditions in Cancun to claim her first WTA Finals title, and she will be hoping to defend her crown on the indoor hard courts in Riyadh this year.

3) Coco Gauff

Coco Gauff may not have quite lived up to the heights of winning the US Open last year, but the American has still showed enough consistency to qualify for her third WTA Finals.

The World No.3 began her season in the best way possible by defending her title in Auckland, following it up with semi-final results at the Australian Open, Indian Wells, Italian Open and Roland Garros.

After a tricky North American hard court swing, Gauff decided to switch things up and parted ways with coach Brad Gilbert, before bringing in Matt Daly.

This move was rewarded for Gauff, as she went onto claim the second WTA 1000 title of her career in Beijing.

Gauff’s previous best at the WTA Finals came last year in Guadalajara, where she reached the semi-finals.

4) Jasmine Paolini

The breakout star of the 2024 season is Jasmine Paolini, who had never surpassed the second round of a Grand Slam prior to this year.

How things have changed for the 28-year-old, having became the first woman since Serena Williams in 2016 to reach both the Roland Garros and Wimbledon singles finals in the same season.

Although Paolini was unable to win either of those finals, the Italian did manage to get her hands on the biggest title of her career at the WTA 1000 event in Dubai back in February.

Not only will Paolini be making her debut in singles at the WTA Finals this year, but she has also qualified for the doubles event alongside compatriot Sara Errani, making her the only person to achieve that feat in 2024.

5) Elena Rybakina

While a large proportion of Elena Rybakina’s 2024 season has been marred by illness and injury, when the Kazakhstani has been on court the results have been generally positive.

This was particularly prevalent in the earlier stages of the year, with the 25-year-old winning WTA 500 titles in Brisbane, Abu Dhabi and Stuttgart.

Rybakina also reached WTA 1000 finals in Doha and Miami, and produced her best Grand Slam result at Wimbledon by reaching the semi-finals.

However, since then Rybakina has only played two matches and is a doubt to even participate at the WTA Finals, with Emma Navarro no doubt waiting in line to take her place as the first alternate.

6) Jessica Pegula

Unlike Rybakina, most of Jessica Pegula’s struggles came in the early stages of the season, before having an impressive North American hard court swing.

This involved missing most of the clay court season including Roland Garros, but since then things have started to look up for Pegula with titles on the grass of Berlin and hard courts in Toronto.

Pegula then went onto end her Grand Slam quarter-final drought and advanced all the way to the US Open final, before eventually losing to Aryna Sabalenka.

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A post shared by Jessie Pegula (@jpegula)

This is the 30-year-old’s third successive year qualifying for the WTA Finals, with Pegula achieving her best result last year by reaching the final in Cancun before suffering a heavy defeat to Iga Swiatek.

7) Zheng Qinwen

The other WTA Finals singles debutant this year is none other than Zheng Qinwen, who kicked off her 2024 season in style by reaching her first Grand Slam final in Melbourne.

However, after this the Chinese No.1 was unable to replicate this form and struggled to match her new status as a top 10 player.

This seemed to change after Wimbledon, with Zheng going onto defend her title in Palermo, before going onto win Olympic gold in Paris.

Although there were no ranking points on the line at the Olympic Games, the confidence this gave Zheng for the remainder of the season has been invaluable.

Since her triumph at the Paris Olympics, Zheng has gone onto reach the US Open quarter-finals, China Open semi-finals and her first WTA 1000 final in Wuhan.

As a result, the 22-year-old will make her WTA Finals in Riyadh and will likely be a big threat given her recent form.

8) Barbora Krejcikova

This year, the WTA followed the ATP by making a rule that any Grand Slam champion would qualify for the year-end Finals as long as they are inside the top 20 of the race.

And Barbora Krejcikova is the first player to make use of that, having played only 32 matches this year, which is 20 less than Rybakina who has played the seventh most amount of matches in this list.

After reaching the Australian Open quarter-finals, Krejcikova struggled for both form and fitness that included losing five consecutive matches between February and April.

However, everything changed during the grass court season when Krejcikova beat four top 15 ranked players en route to replicating her mentor Jana Novotna and claiming her second Grand Slam singles title at Wimbledon.

WTA Finals 2024 Doubles Qualifiers

The doubles lineup for the WTA Finals is also set, featuring the likes of Jelena Ostapenko, Hsieh Su-wei, Katerina Siniakova and the aforementioned Jasmine Paolini: