The WTA Tour has reached its climax with the prestigious year-end Finals taking place in South America for the first time at the Panamerican Tennis Center in Mexico.
The eight highest ranked players have qualified for the event based on the points they have earned over the past 12 months. At stake is a prize money offering of up to $1.68M should a player clinch the title without losing a single match, as well as a maximum of 1500 ranking points.
Players have been separated into two groups with the top two of those progressing to the knockout stages later in the week. Group Chichén Itzá will feature Aryna Sabalenka, Maria Sakkari, Iga Swiatek and Paula Badosa. Meanwhile, Group Teotihuacán has Barbora Krejcikova, Karolina Pliskova, Garbiñe Muguruza and Anett Kontaveit.
Ahead of the 2021 WTA Finals getting underway, here are five facts to know about this year’s tournament.
The debutantes
This year six out of the eight participants in the WTA Finals are playing in the tournament for the first time in their careers. The only exceptions are Pliskova and Muguruza. This year will be the fifth time Pliskova has played in the season-ending event which is the joint-four highest number of appearances among active players. Only Svetlana Kuznetsova, Petra Kvitova and Serena Williams have played in more. The Czech has managed to progress out of the group stages in three out of her four previous appearances but is yet to make a final. Meanwhile, two-time Grand Slam winner Muguruza will be making her fourth appearance and her first since 2017. Her best run was six years ago when she reached the semi-finals.
The history makers
Sakkari and Kontaveit will be the first players representing their countries in the tournament. Greece’s Sakkari has already achieved a series of milestones for her country this season, including being the first woman to reach a Grand Slam semi-final and the first woman to crack the top 10. As for 25-year-old Kontaveit, who was the last player to qualify for the finals, she became the first Estonian to break into the world’s top 10 this season.
At the other end of the spectrum the Czech Republic will be represented in the tournament for the 10th time in a row. They are the only country to be represented in the singles draw by multiple players with Pliskova and Krejčíková taking part.
Double duty
French Open champion Krejčíková is the first player since Pliskova in 2016 to be playing in both the singles and doubles events. She is the top seed in the doubles draw alongside Katerina Siniakova, as well as the second seed in singles. Should she win both, Krejčíková would become the first player to do so at the WTA Finals since Martina Hingis back in 2000.
The Czech 25-year-old won 15 matches in a row earlier this year during May to July which is the longest winning streak achieved by a WTA player on the Tour this session.
Kontaveit on fire
Despite being the last to qualify, Kontaveit’s recent surge in form positions her as a big contender for the crown. She has won three out of the past five tournaments played in Chicago, Moscow and Cluj-Napoca. During that period she has achieved five wins over top 20 opponents with the last of those being against Simona Halep in Romania.
Kontaveit has won four titles in total this year which is more than any other player participating in the WTA Finals. The only player to have won more than her is world No.1 Ash Barty with five. Barty has chosen not to participate in the event in order to prepare for the new season.
A new group of leaders
This time last year, five out of the eight players participating had never broken into the world’s top 10 on the WTA Tour. Swiatek, Badosa, Krejcikova, Sakkari and Kontaveit all achieved this milestone in 2021.
| Ranking W/C 9/11/2020 | Ranking W/C 8/11/2021 | |
| Iga Swiatek | 17 | 9 |
| Maria Sakkari | 22 | 6 |
| Anett Kontaveit | 23 | 8 |
| Paula Badosa | 69 | 10 |
| Barbora Krejčíková | 74 | 3 |
SEE ALSO: WTA Finals Daily Preview: Fresh Faces Invade the 2021 Field
