With the exit of several of the WTA’s biggest names last year, including Serena Williams and Ash Barty, fans of women’s tennis have been left wondering whether any players could seize the opportunity to become the next living legend of the women’s game. After the first quarter of the 2023 season, Elena Rybakina and Aryna Sabalenka have made some of the biggest moves towards that achievement and done the most to threaten the dominance of Iga Swiatek. Let’s take a closer look at the gains these and other stars of the WTA have made in the player ratings since the start of the year.
In the current all-surface player ratings for the WTA there are five competitors who are heading into the 2nd quarter of the season with ratings over 2200 points (Figure 1). Petra Kvitova takes the 5th position with 2207 points. Kvitova had an up-and-down start to the year but since Indian Wells she has hit her stride, earning big wins over Jessica Pegula and Jelena Ostapenko in the desert and taking the Miami title home over Elena Rybakina. The Sunshine Double added a total of 114 rating points to Kvitova’s standing.
Figure 1. Current all-surface standings for WTA players who were among the top 64 most highly rated at either the start of the year or now.
The next place in the top 5 belongs to Barbora Krejcikova with a rating of 2305. Krejcikova’s biggest single event this season so far was Dubai, where Krejcikova defeated Iga Swiatek to take the title. In that event alone, Krejcikova added 150 points to her rating.
Firmly in the 3rd and 2nd places of the ratings at 2361 and 2414 points are Elena Rybakina and Aryna Sabalenka. The pair has crossed paths in the finals of two of the biggest events of the first quarter: the Aussie Open and Indian Wells. Sabalenka was the victor in both cases but Rybakina showed she was undeterred by those title losses in making it to the Miami final as well. With Rybakina and Sabalenka hot on each other’s heels it is no surprise that they have seen nearly equal gains in their ratings so far this year, each claiming +250 rating points overall.
Figure 2. Start-of-year ratings versus current ratings for WTA players who were among the top 64 most highly rated at either time point. Named players are those with a change of 60 ratings point, in either direction, since the start of the year.
The highest expectations for the 2023 season have rested on Iga Swiatek’s shoulders. At this stage, Swiatek has held steady in the rankings and more or less met expectations as the ratings No. 1 at 2442 points. She has taken four losses this year but, given that all were against top competitors, her ratings level never took a huge hit. What has changed is that the gulf in the ratings that existed between Swiatek and the rest of her WTA competitors at the start of the year has been closed substantially by the gains of Sabalenka and Rybakina.
When we look at the current versus start-of-year ratings in Figure 2, it is notable that more players have improved their form than declined. In fact, the average change in the ratings among players who were in the top 64 currently or at the start of the year is +50 points. Two of the highest rated players who have dropped in performance are Caroline Garcia and Ons Jabeur, but each have lost less than 80 points.
So after the first 3 months of WTA competition, the main story is how much improvement we are seeing among players who already started the year at a really high level. With most top players firing up or holding steady to a strong level of performance, expect an especially fierce clay court season in 2023.
"The pair has crossed paths in the finals of two of the biggest events of the first quarter: the Aussie Open and Indian Wells. Sabalenka was the victor in both cases but Rybakina showed she was undeterred by those title losses in making it to the Miami final as well."
Hopefully didn't put this into the ratings calculation!