Aryna Sabalenka wants to step up more in the future to ensure that disasters like this year's WTA Finals don't happen.
The Belarusian was not impressed with this year's WTA Finals, specifically the event's organization, and she has a bone to pick with the WTA. The whole process, from start to finish, was an absolute disaster, and players were fuming.
Not only was the venue announced pretty nonchalantly, but there were very few consultations with players about anything, resulting in crazy scenes. The lack of any sort of cooperation from the WTA has now become a huge problem.
It's the main problem Sabalenka has with all of it, the lack of cooperation between the players and the organization, which is supposed to protect their interests first.
That’s the problem. They just announced it, and that’s it. Like some of the players just saw a tweet and were like ‘Okay, we’re playing in Cancun.’ It’s just like they made the decision and that’s it. That’s the problem.
That they’re not asking all the players where they would like to play. I would like to be involved in these kind of decisions. I have to play here. Having this ability to control these decisions would be really helpful.
Having players be more assertive in the decision-making process should be a move that could move everything forward, but it will depend on how much the WTA is willing to cooperate.
After all, it takes two to tango, but this unilateral approach hasn't been working. You don't want players going to the media about their complaints; that type of stuff is best handled in-house.
However, with the current approach, it seems unlikely. We'll see what happens in the future, but disasters like this year's WTA Finals should not happen again.