Swiatek Enters Last Part Of Season With Most Wins But Still As World No. 2

WTA
Wednesday, 27 September 2023 at 18:30
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Iga Swiatek has the most wins this year on the WTA Tour, but she's still number two in the WTA Rankings ahead of the season's final stretch.

Tennis rankings can be rather confusing because they're not entirely based on one season. There are two rankings in tennis, essentially. One is the regular ranking, and the other is the race. The race is the more accurate ranking regarding current standings because it shows players' performance only that year.

Swiatek is number two in the race as well as the ranking, trailing Aryna Sabalenka, who has more points than the Polish player. Why? Well, she played more consistently. Both have won one Grand Slam this year, but Sabalenka went further in New York and London, where the point difference comes.

Swiatek didn't play enough smaller events to really make up for the difference compared to last year when she dominated the smaller events. The regular ranking is calculated differently. It basically shows the standings of the past year regardless of where in the calendar we are.

So there are some players that currently have points on their tally that they didn't win yet because they won it last year. Even so, Swiatek still trails Sabalenka in the number of points in that ranking as well. The reason is the same, despite winning more matches, the Belarusian won the bigger matches, earning herself more points.

Things could change in the coming weeks as plenty of points are up for grabs. Both will be in action, and the player that performs better will likely end up being world number one. Whether that player ends up with the most wins won't matter because not all wins are equal.

Five wins at a Grand Slam are far more worth than those at a WTA 500 event, and Sabalenka had far more of the former compared to Swiatek. That's why she's ahead.

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